“You will grow accustomed to it, my child.”
“Never,” said Léonie positively. “It does not please me at all.”
“But then,” murmured his Grace, “I do not use it to please you.”
“Pardon, Monseigneur!” she answered contritely, and peeped at him through her lashes. The irresistible dimple quivered.
“She’ll snare him,” thought Fanny. “She is all too fascinating.”
———«»——————«»——————«»———
Justin took his ward down to Avon by coach the following day, in company with Madam Field, on whose amiable vapidity Léonie looked with scant respect. Justin was quick to read her opinion of the lady, and when they arrived at Avon, took her aside.
“This,” said Léonie buoyantly, “is a nice house. I like it.”
“I am rejoiced to hear you say so,” replied his Grace ironically.
Léonie looked round the panelled hall, with its carven chairs, its paintings, and tapestry, and the gallery above.
“Perhaps it is a little sombre,” she said. “Who is this gentleman?” She went to a suit of armour, and regarded it with interest.
“It is not a gentleman at all, my infant. It is the armour one of my ancestors wore.”
“Vraiment?” She wandered away to the foot of the stairs, and inspected an ancient portrait. “Is this another ancestor, this foolish woman?”
“A very famous one, my dear.”
“She has a stupid smile,” Léonie remarked. “Why was she famous? What for?”
“Principally for her indiscretions. Which reminds me, child, that I want to speak to you.”
“Yes, Monseigneur?” Léonie was staring now at a shield which hung above the fireplace. “‘J’y serai’. That is French.”
“Your intelligence is remarkable. I wish to speak to you of my cousin, Madam Field.”
Léonie looked at him over her shoulder, grimacing.
“May I say what I think, Monseigneur?”
He sat down on the great carved table, swinging his eyeglass.
“To me, yes.”
“She is just a fool, Monseigneur.”
“Indubitably. And therefore, my infant, you must not only bear with her folly, but you must be at pains to cause her no trouble.”
Léonie seemed to debate within herself.
“Must I, Monseigneur?”
Justin looked at her, and recognized the naughty twinkle in her eye.
“Because I will it so, my child.”
The little straight nose wrinkled.
“Oh, eh bien!”
“I thought so,” remarked Avon beneath his breath. “It is a promise, Léonie?”
“I do not think that I will promise,” Léonie temporized. “I will try.” She came and stood before him. “Monseigneur, it is very kind of you to bring me to this beautiful place, and to give me everything just as though I were not the sister of an innkeeper. Thank you very much.”
Justin looked at her for a moment, and his lips twisted in a curious smile.
“You think me a paragon of all the virtues, don’t you, ma fille?”
“Oh no!” she answered candidly. “I think it is only to me that you are kind. With some women you are not good at all. I cannot help knowing these things, Monseigneur!”
“And yet, child, you are content to remain with me?”
“But of course!” she answered in some surprise.
“You are full of trust,” he remarked.
“Of course,” she said again.
“This,” said Avon, looking at the rings on his hand, “is a new experience. I wonder what Hugh would say?”
“Oh, he would pull down his mouth, so! and shake his head. I think he is sometimes not very wise.”
He laughed, and laid a hand on her shoulder.
“I never thought, ma fille, to take unto me a ward so much after mine own heart. I beg you will be careful not to shock Madam Field.”
“But with you I may say what I please?”
“You always do,” he replied.
“And you will stay here?”
“For the present. I have to attend to your education, you see. There are things you have to learn that I can best teach you.”
“What, par example?”
“To ride?”
“On a horse? Vraiment?”
“The prospect pleases you?”
“Yes, oh yes! And will you teach me to fight with a sword, Monseigneur?”
“It’s not a ladylike occupation, ma fille.”
“But I do not always want to be a lady, Monseigneur! If I may learn to fight with a sword I will try very hard to learn the other silly things.”
He looked down at her, smiling.
“I believe you are trying to drive a bargain with me! What if I will not teach you to fence?”
She dimpled.
“Why, then I fear I shall be very stupid when you teach me to curtsy, Monseigneur. Oh, Monseigneur, say you will! Please say it quickly! Madame is coming.”
“You force my hand,” he bowed. “I will teach you, imp.”
Madam Field entered the hall in time to see her charge execute a neat step-dance. She murmured expostulations.
CHAPTER XIII
The Education of Léonie
The Duke remained at Avon for over a month, during which time Léonie applied herself energetically to the task of becoming a lady. Madam Field’s ideal of this estate was luckily not Avon’s. He had no wish to see his ward sitting primly over her stitchery, which was just as well, perhaps, for after the first attempt Léonie declared that nothing would induce her to ply a needle. Madam Field was a little flustered by this defection, and by Léonie’s taste for sword-play, but she was far too good-natured and indefinite to do more than murmur nervous remonstrances. She stood very much in awe of her cousin, and although she was by birth an Alastair she felt herself to be a wholly inferior creature. She had been happy enough with her husband, an obscure gentleman with a taste for farming, but she knew that in the eyes of her family she had disgraced herself by marrying him. This had not troubled her much while he lived, but now that he was dead, and she had returned to what had once been her own milieu, she was uncomfortably conscious of the step downwards that she had taken in her foolish youth. She was rather frightened of Avon, but she liked to live in his house. When she looked about her, at faded tapestries, at stretches of velvet lawns, at portraits innumerable, and crossed swords above the doorway, she remembered anew the glory of past Alastairs, and some almost forgotten chord stirred within her.
Léonie was enchanted by Avon Court, and demanded to know its history. She walked with Justin in the grounds, and learned how Hugo Alastair, coming with the Conqueror, settled there, and built himself a fair dwelling, which was destroyed in the troublous times of King Stephen; how it was built again by Sir Roderick Alastair; how he was given a barony, and prospered, and how the first Earl, under Queen Mary, pulled down the old building and erected the present house. And she learned of the bombardment that partially destroyed the West Wing, when Earl Henry held all for the King against the usurper Cromwell, and was rewarded for it at the Restoration by a dukedom. She saw the sword of the last Duke, the same that he had used in tragic ’15, for King James III, and heard a small part of Justin’s own adventures, ten years ago, for King Charles III. Justin touched but lightly on this period of his life; his work in that attempt, Léonie guessed, had been secret and tortuous, but she learned that the true King was Charles Edward Stuart, and learned to speak of the little war-like man on the throne as Elector George.