Page:Harper's New Monthly Magazine - v109.djvu/22

12 shoulders went higher still,—"do you know, my cousin Henri actually gave me a puppy of the great breed—the breed, you know—the dogs of St. Hubert. Or at least he would, if Maman would have let me bring it over. And she wouldn't! Just think of that!—When there are thousands of people in France who'd give the eyes out of their head for one. I cried all one night—Allons!—faut pas y penser!"—she shook back the hair from her eyes with an impatient gesture. "My cousins have got a château, you know, in the Seine-et-Oise. They've promised to ask me next year—when the Grand-Duke Paul comes—if I'll promise to be- have. You see, I'm not a bit like French girls—I had so many affairs!"

Her eyes flashed with laughter.

Ashe laughed too.

"Are you going to tell me about them also?"

She drew herself up.

"No ! I play fair always,—ask anybody! Oh, I do want to go back to France so badly!" Once more she was all appeal and childishness. "You know, it's all nonsense about convents. They don't bother you about religion. They're not a bit strict! You needn't learn anything you don't want to—and you can eat as many sweets as ever you like! You can always go out and see your friends—and then there are the holidays. No, I won't stay in England!—I have made up my mind to that!"

"How long has it taken?"

"A fortnight," she said, slowly,—"just a fortnight."

"That hardly seems time enough—does it?" said Ashe. " Give us a little longer!"

"No—I—I hate you!" said Lady Kitty, with a strange drop in her voice. Her little fingers began to drum on the table near her, and to Ashe's intense astonishment he saw her eyes fill with tears.

Suddenly a movement towards the other room set in around them. Madame d'Estrées could be heard giving directions. A space was made in the large drawing-room—a little table appeared in it, and a footman placed thereon a glass of water.

Lady Kitty looked up.

"Oh! that detestable man!" she said, drawing back. "No—I can't, I can't bear it. Come with me!" and beckoning to Ashe, she fled with precipitation into the farther part of the inner drawing-room, out of her mother's sight. Ashe followed her, and she dropped, panting and elate, into a chair.

Meanwhile the outer room gathered to hear the recitation of some vers de société, fondly believed by their author to be of a very pretty and Praedian make. They certainly amused the company, who laughed and clapped as each neat personality emerged. Lady Kitty passed the time either in a running commentary on the reciter, which occasionally convulsed her companion, or else in holding her small hands over her ears.

When it was over, she drew a long breath.

"How Maman can!—Oh, how bête you English are to applaud such a man! You have only one poet, haven't you?—one living poet? Ah! I shouldn't have laughed if it had been he!"

"I suppose you mean Geoffry Cliffe?" said Ashe, amused. "Nobody abroad seems ever to have heard of any one else."

"Well, of course, I just long to know him! Every one says he is so dangerous!—he makes all the women fall in love with him. That's delicious! He shouldn't make me! Do you know him?"

"He was my fag at Eton. I 'worked him off' twice," said Ashe.

She inquired what the phrase might mean, and when informed, flushed hotly, denouncing the English school system as quite unfit for gentlemen and men of honor. Her French cousins would sooner die than suffer such a thing. Then in the midst of her tirade she suddenly paused, and fixing Ashe with her brilliant eyes, she asked him a surprising question, in a changed and steady voice.

"Is Lady Tranmore not well?"

Ashe was fairly startled.

"Thank you,—I left her quite well. Have you—"

"Did Maman ask her to come to-night?"

It was Ashe's turn to redden.

"I don't know. But—we are in mourning, you see, for my brother."

Her face changed and softened instantly. "Are you? I'm so sorry. I—I always say something stupid. Then—Lady Tranmore used to come to Maman's parties—before—"