Miss Challoner picked the tray up again, with a small unhappy sigh. “I did not mean to offend you, my lord,” she said wistfully. “I thought, perhaps, that if I prepared it very carefully you would not be so unkind as to refuse even to partake of a spoonful.”
“Then you are wrong, ma’am,” replied his lordship icily.
“Yes,” Miss Challoner said rather sadly “I see that I was. I suppose it was presumptuous of me. I am sorry, sir.”
She went slowly to the door. My lord said, in the voice of one goaded beyond endurance: “Oh, bring it back, girl—bring it back! I’ll swallow the brew if it will please you.”
Miss Challoner seemed to hesitate. “Yes, indeed, it would please me, but I do not at all desire to plague you with it.”
“For God’s sake let’s have no more words!” besought Vidal. “Give it to me, and have done!”
Miss Challoner obediently brought back the tray. She sat down by the bed, and watched his lordship drink the gruel. He looked suspiciously at her, but she preserved an innocent front. He finished what was left in the bowl, and put it down. “Mary,” said he, “come a little closer and present your left cheek.”
A dimple quivered. “Why, sir?”
“Don’t you know?” said Vidal.
She laughed. “Why yes, sir. You would dearly love to box my ears.”
“I should,” he said. “Don’t think I’m deceived by that meek face! Where are you going?”
“Down to the parlour, sir.”
“Stay with me. I want to talk to you.” This was decidedly a command. Miss Challoner raised her eyebrows in fault hauteur. Vidal grinned. “Dear Mary, pray do me the honour of remaining at my side.”
She sat down again, slightly inclining her head. “Certainly, sir, but I do not think I gave you leave to call me Mary.”
“Give me leave now, then,” said Vidal. “Are we not betrothed?”
She shook her head. “No, my lord.”
“Dominic,” he corrected.
“No, my lord,” repeated Miss Challoner steadily.
“Mary,” said his lordship, “may I proffer a piece of good advice?” She looked inquiring. “Do not be for ever arguing with me,” said the Marquis. “It will be very much better for you to refrain. My intentions are admirable, but I seldom act up to them, and I should not like to lose my temper with you again.”
“But, indeed, my lord, I cannot—”
“Dear Mary,” said his lordship, “hold your tongue!”
“Very well, sir,” replied Miss Challoner obediently.
“First,” Vidal said, “I must ask you to keep within doors while we remain in Dieppe. I don’t want a chance traveller to see you here.”
Miss Challoner wrinkled her brow thoughtfully. “I will do as you wish, of course, but I do not think I number among my acquaintance anyone likely to be visiting France at ibis season.”
“Possibly not,” answered the Marquis. “But I number many. Second, I much regret that it will not be possible for me to marry you immediately we arrive in Paris.”
“Do you mean, sir, that you have, upon reflection, perceived the wisdom of my plans?”
“No, ma’am, I do not,” Vidal said. “I mean that there are Certain difficulties attendant upon the marriage of English Protestants in France.”
“Oh!” said Miss Challoner hopefully.
“The obvious course is to visit the Embassy,” said my lord, “but since the Ambassador is related to me and I know personally at least three of the Secretaries, the Embassy is the last place I shall visit.”
“If,” said Miss Challoner, “you feel so much aversion from displaying me to your numerous friends, sir, I wonder that you still persist in this determination to wed me,”
“And if,” said the Marquis with some asperity, “you would put yourself to the trouble of employing the brain I imagine you must possess, you might possibly perceive that my reluctance to display you to my numerous friends arises from motives of the most disinterested chivalry.”
“Indeed?” Miss Challoner said, unabashed. “Well, I could scarce be expected to think that, could I?”
“Oho!” said his lordship. “So you’ve claws, have you?” Miss Challoner said nothing. “To put it plainly, Miss Challoner, the Ambassador, my esteemed cousin, and his Secretaries, my unregenerate friends, have not infrequently visited my hôtel when a lady was there to act as hostess. They would not consider the presence of a lady under my roof worthy of comment. But were I to walk into the Embassy with a request to be married at once to a lady, Irving already under my protection, I should cause, not comment, but something in the nature of an uproar. Within a week, my dear, it would be all over town that you’d run off with me, and trapped me into wedding you.”
“Oh!” said Miss Challoner, flushing.
“Precisely, my love,” said his lordship sardonically. “So since the reason for our marriage is to stop any breath of scandal attaching to your fair name, we shall be wed as quietly as I can contrive. After which, I can easily make it appear that I met you, very properly, in Paris, where you were sojourning with friends, and married you, most romantically, out of hand.”
“I see,” said Miss Challoner. “And how do you propose to achieve all this, my lord?”
“There are still Protestants in France, my dear. All I have to do is to find a pastor. But it may not be easy, and until I have done it you will have to remain hidden in my house. I can’t trust my aunt or I’d place you in her charge.” He paused. “There is of course my obese great-uncle Armand de Saint-Vire. No. His tongue wags too much.”
“You would appear to have many relatives in Paris, sir,” remarked Miss Challoner. “I felicitate you.”
“You need not,” said Vidal. “I am more in the habit, myself, of consigning ’em all to the devil. Not only is my mother a Frenchwoman, but my paternal grandmother must needs have been one too. The result, ma’am, is that my damned French cousins litter Paris. There is the aunt in whose charge I’ll not place you. She is more properly a cousin, but is known to my generation as Tante Elisabeth. You’ll meet her. She has a fondness for me. The rest of the family need not concern you. I never permit ’em to disturb me.”
“And your obese great-uncle?” inquired Miss Challoner.
“Ah, he don’t belong to that side of the family. He’s the head of my mother’s family. He married upon coming into the title, very late in life. He is a friend of my father’s, and like him, has one son, my cousin Bertrand. You’ll meet him, too.”
“Shall I?” said Miss Challoner. “When?”
“When I’ve married you.”
“The prospect is naturally alluring, sir,” said Miss Challoner, rising, “but even these treats in store don’t tempt me to marriage.” Upon which she curtsied gracefully and walked to the door.
“Vixen,” said his lordship, as she opened it.
Miss Challoner curtsied again, and withdrew.
Upon the following morning she found his lordship partaking of a substantial breakfast, and since he seemed to be very much better, she made no demur. The surgeon visited the inn at noon, and although he exclaimed aloud against Vidal’s intention to travel that day, he had no objection, he said, to his patient leaving his bed for a short time. When he had gone Miss Challoner prevailed upon the Marquis to postpone their departure one more day. She spent the afternoon in her own room, but came down to the private salle shortly before the dinner hour, and walked plump into an agitated conference at the foot of the stairs.
Several excited persons were gathered about a neat and unemotional gentleman in travelling dress of unmistakable English cut. M. Plançon, the landlord, was apparently trying to make himself intelligible to this gentleman, but in the intervals of volubility, he cast up despairing hands to heaven, while two serving-men and an ostler took up the tale with the maximum amount of gesticulation and noise.