WHEREIN CYNTHIA TAKES HER OWN LINE
When the Mercury, shining from Dale's attentions, halted noiselessly
opposite the College Green Hotel on the Saturday morning, Count
Edouard Marigny was standing there; the Du Vallon was not in evidence,
and its owner's attire bespoke other aims than motoring, at any rate
for the hour.
Evidently he was well content with himself. A straw hat was set on the
back of his head, a cigarette stuck between his lips, his hands were
thrust into his trousers pockets, and his feet were spread widely
apart. Taken altogether, he had the air of a man without a care in the
world.
He smiled, too, in the most friendly fashion, when Medenham's eyes met
his.
"I hear that Simmonds is unable to carry out his contract," he said
cheerfully.
"You are mistaken, a second time, monsieur," said Medenham.
"Why, then, are _you_ here this morning?"
"I am acting for Simmonds. If anything, my car is slightly superior to
his, while I may be regarded as an equally competent driver, so the
contract is kept in all essentials."
Marigny still smiled. The Frenchman of mid-Victorian romance would
have shelved this point by indulging in "an inimitable shrug"; but
nowadays Parisians of the Count's type do not shrug--with John Bull's
clothing they have adopted no small share of his stolidness.
"It is immaterial," he said. "I have sent my man to offer him my Du
Vallon, and Smith will go with him to explain its humors. You, as a
skilled motorist, understand that a car is of the feminine gender.
Like any other charming demoiselle, it demands the exercise of
tact--it yields willingly to gentle handling----"
Medenham cut short the Count's neatly turned phrases.
"Simmonds has no need to avail himself of your courtesy," he said. "As
for the rest, give me your address in Paris, and when next I visit the
French capital I shall be delighted to analyze these subtleties with
you."
"Ah, most admirable! But the really vital question before us to-day is
your address in London, Mr. Fitzroy."
Marigny dwelt on the surname as if it were a succulent oyster, and, in
the undeniable surprise of the moment, Medenham was forced to believe
that "Captain" Devar, formerly of Horton's Horse, had dared all by
telling his confederate the truth, or some part of the truth. The two
men looked squarely at each other, and Marigny did not fail to
misinterpret the dubious frown on Medenham's face.
He descended a step or two, and crossed the pavement leisurely,
dropping his voice so that it might not reach the ears of a porter,
laden with the ladies' traveling boxes, who appeared in the doorway.
"Why should we quarrel?" he asked, with an engaging frankness well
calculated to reassure a startled evildoer. "In this matter I am
anxious to treat you as a gentleman. _Allons, donc!_ Hurry off
instantly, and tell Simmonds to bring the Du Vallon here. Leave me to
explain everything to Miss Vanrenen. Surely you agree that she ought
to be spared the unpleasantness of a wrangle--or, shall we say, an
exposure? You see," he continued with a trifle more animation, and
speaking in French, "the game is not worth the candle. In a few hours,
at the least, you will be in the hands of the police, whereas, by
reaching London to-night, you may be able to pacify the Earl of
Fairholme. I can help, perhaps. I will say all that is possible, and
my testimony ought to carry some weight."
Medenham was thoroughly mystified. That the Frenchman was not yet
aware of his identity was now clear enough, though, with Devar's
probable duplicity still running in his mind, he could not solve the
puzzle presented by this vaunted half-knowledge.
Again the other attributed his perplexity to anything except its real
cause.
"I am willing to befriend you," he urged emphatically. "You have acted
foolishly, but not criminally, I hope. In your anxiety to help a
colleague you forgot the fine distinction which the law draws between
_meum_ and _tuum_----"
"No," said Medenham, turning to the porter. "Put the larger box on the
carrier, and strap the other on top of it--the locks outwards. Then
you will find that they fit exactly."
"Don't be a headstrong idiot," muttered the Count, with a certain heat
of annoyance making itself felt in his patronizing tone. "Miss
Vanrenen will come out at any minute----"
Medenham glanced at the clock by the side of the speed indicator.
"Miss Vanrenen is due now unless she is being purposely detained by
Mrs. Devar," he commented dryly.
"But why persist in this piece of folly?" growled Marigny, to whose
reluctant consciousness the idea of failure suddenly presented itself.
"You must realize by this time that I know who owns your car. A
telegram from me will put the authorities on your track, your arrest
will follow, and Miss Vanrenen will be subjected to the gravest
inconvenience. _Sacre nom d'un pipe!_ If you will not yield to fair
means I must resort to foul. It comes to this--you either quit Bristol
at once or I inform Miss Vanrenen of the trick you have played on
her."
Medenham turned and picked up from the seat the pair of stout
driving-gloves which had caught Smith's inquiring eye by reason of
their quality and substance. He drew on the right-hand glove, and
buttoned it. When he answered, he spoke with irritating slowness.
"Would it not be better for all concerned that the lady in whose
behalf you profess to be so deeply moved should be permitted to
continue her tour without further disturbance? You and I can meet in
London, monsieur, and I shall then have much pleasure in convincing
you that I am a most peaceable and law-abiding person."
"No," came the angry retort. "I have decided. I withdraw my offer to
overlook your offense. At whatever cost, Miss Vanrenen must be
protected until her father learns how his wishes have been disregarded
by a couple of English bandits."
"Sorry," said Medenham coolly.
He alighted in the roadway, as the driving seat was near the curb. A
glance into the vestibule of the hotel revealed Cynthia, in motor coat
and veil, giving some instructions, probably with regard to letters,
to a deferential hall-porter. Walking rapidly round the front of the
car, he caught Marigny's shoulder with his left hand.
"If you dare to open your mouth in Miss Vanrenen's presence, other
than by way of some commonplace remark, I shall forthwith smash your
face to a jelly," he said.
A queer shiver ran through the Frenchman's body, but Medenham did not
commit the error of imagining that his adversary was afraid. His grip
on Marigny's shoulder tightened. The two were now not twelve inches
apart, and the Englishman read that involuntary tension of the muscles
aright, for there is a palsy of rage as of fear.
"I have some acquaintance with the _savate_," he said suavely. "Please
take my word for it, and you will be spared an injury. A moment ago
you offered to treat me like a gentleman. I reciprocate now by being
willing to accept your promise to hold your tongue. Miss Vanrenen is
coming.... What say you?"
"I agree," said Marigny, though his dark eyes blazed redly.
"Ah, thanks!" and Medenham's left hand busied itself once more with
the fastening of the glove.
"You understand, of course?" he heard, in a soft snarl.
"Perfectly. The truce ends with my departure. Meanwhile, you are
acting wisely. I don't suppose I shall ever respect you so much
again."
"Now, you two--what are you discussing?" cried Cynthia from the porch.
"I hope you are not trying to persuade my chauffeur to yield his place
to you, Monsieur Marigny. Once bitten, twice shy, you know, and I
would insist on checking each mile by the map if you were at the
wheel."
[Illustration: "Now, you two--what are you discussing?"
_Page 148_]
"Your chauffeur is immovable, mademoiselle," was the ready answer,
though the accompanying smile was not one of the Count's best efforts.
"He looks it. Why are you vexed, Fitzroy? Can't you forgive your
friend Simmonds?"
Cynthia lifted those demure blue eyes of hers, and held Medenham's
gaze steadfast.
"I trust you are not challenging contradiction, Miss Vanrenen?" he
said, with deliberate resolve not to let her slip back thus easily
into the role of gracious employer.
She did not flinch, but her eyebrows arched a little.
"Oh, no," she said offhandedly. "Simmonds told me his misfortunes last
night, and I assumed that you and he had settled matters
satisfactorily between you."
"As for that," broke in the Count, "I have just offered my car as a
substitute, but Fitzroy prefers to take you as far as Hereford, at any
cost."
"Hereford! I understood from Simmonds that Mr. Fitzroy would see us
through the remainder of the tour?"
"Monsieur Marigny is somewhat vague in our island topography: you saw
that last evening," said Medenham.
He smiled. Cynthia, too, glanced from one to the other with a frank
merriment that showed how fully she appreciated their mutual dislike.
As for Marigny, his white teeth gleamed now in a sarcastic grin.
"Adversity is a strict master," he said, lapsing into his own language
again. "My blunder of yesterday has shown me the need of caution, so I
go no farther than Hereford in my thoughts."
"It is more to the point to tell us how far you are going in your
car," cried the girl lightly.
"I, too, hope to be in Hereford to-night. Mrs. Devar says you mean to
spend Sunday there. If that is a fixed thing, and you can bear with me
for a few hours, I shall meet you there without fail."
"Come, by all means, if your road lies that way; but don't let us make
formal engagements. I love to think that I am drifting at will through
this land of gardens and apple blossom. And, just think of it--three
cathedrals in one day--a Minster for breakfast, lunch, and dinner,
with Tintern Abbey thrown in for afternoon tea. Such a wealth of
medievalism makes my head reel.... I was in there for matins," and she
nodded to the grave old pile rearing its massive Gothic within a few
paces of the hotel. "At high noon we shall visit Gloucester, and
to-night we shall see Hereford. All that within a short hundred miles,
to say nothing of Chepstow, Monmouth, the Wye Valley! Ah, me! I shall
never overtake my correspondence while there are so many glories to
describe. See, I have bought some darling little guidebooks which tell
you just what to say in a letter. What between judicious extracts and
a sheaf of picture postcards scribbled at each place I'll try and keep
my friends in good humor."
She produced from a pocket three of the red-covered volumes so
familiar to Americans in Britain--and to Britons themselves, for that
matter, when the belated discovery is made that it is not necessary to
cross the Channel in order to enjoy a holiday--and showed them
laughingly to Medenham.
"Now," she cried, "I am armed against you. No longer will you be able
to paralyze me with your learning. If you say 1269 at Tintern I shall
retort with 1387 at Monmouth. When you point out Nell Gwynne's
birthplace in Hereford, I shall take you to the Haven Inn, where David
Garrick was born, and, if you aren't very, very good, I shall tell you
how much the New Town Hall cost, and who laid the foundation stone."
Medenham alone held the key to the girl's lively mood, and it was a
novel and quite delightful sensation to be thus admitted to the inner
shrine of her emotions, as it were. She was chattering at random in
order to smooth away the awkwardness of meeting him after that
whispered indiscretion at their parting overnight. Here, at least,
Marigny was hopelessly at sea--_desoriente_, as he would have put
it--because he could not possibly know that Cynthia herself had
counseled the disappearance of Simmonds. Indeed, he attributed her
high spirits to mere politeness--to her wish that he should believe
she had forgotten the fiasco on the Mendips.
This imagined salving of his wounded vanity served only to inflame him
the more against Medenham. He was still afire with resentment, since
no Frenchman can understand the rude Saxon usage that enforces
submission under a threat of physical violence. That a man should be
ready to defend his honor--to convince an opponent by endeavoring to
kill him--yes, he accepted without cavil those tenets of the French
social code. But the brutal British fixity of purpose displayed by
this truculent chauffeur left him gasping with indignation. He was
quite sure that the man meant exactly what he had said. He felt that
any real departure from the compact wrung from him by force would
prove disastrous to his personal appearance, and he was sensible of a
certain weighing underlook in the Englishman's eyes when his seemingly
harmless chatter hinted at a change of existing plans as soon as
Hereford was reached.
But that was a mere feint, a preliminary flourish, such as a practiced
swordsman executes in empty air before saluting his opponent. He had
not the slightest intention of testing Medenham's pugilistic powers
just then. The reasonable probability of having his chief features
beaten to a pulp was not inviting, while the crude efficacy of the
notion, in its influence on Miss Vanrenen's affairs, was not the least
stupefying element in a difficult and wholly unforeseen situation. He
realized fully that anything in the nature of a scuffle would alienate
the girl's sympathies forever, no matter how strong a case for
interference he might present afterwards. The chauffeur would be
dismissed on the spot, but with the offender would go his own prospect
of winning the heiress to the Vanrenen millions.
So Count Edouard swallowed his spleen, though the requisite effort
must have dissipated some of his natural shrewdness, or he could not
have failed to read more correctly the tokens of embarrassment given
by Cynthia's heightened color, by her eager vivacity, by her
breathless anxiety not to discuss the substitution of one driver for
the other.
Medenham was about to disclaim any intention of measuring his lore
against that in the guidebooks when Mrs. Devar bustled out.
"Awfully sorry," she began, "but I had to wire James----"
Her eyes fell on Medenham and the Mercury. Momentarily rendered
speechless, she rallied bravely.
"I thought, from what Count Edouard said----"
"Miss Vanrenen has lost faith in me, even in my beautiful automobile,"
broke in Marigny with a quickness that spoiled a pathetic glance meant
for Cynthia.
The American girl, however, was weary of the fog of innuendo and
hidden purpose that seemed to be an appanage of the Frenchman and his
car.
"For goodness' sake," she cried, "let us regard it as a settled thing
that Fitzroy takes Simmonds's place until we reach London again.
Surely we have the best of the bargain. If the two men are satisfied
why should we have anything to say against it?"
Cynthia was her father's daughter, and the attribute of personal
dominance that in the man's case had proved so effective in dealing
with Milwaukees now made itself felt in the minor question of
"transportation" presented by Medenham and his motor. Her blue eyes
hardened, and a firm note rang in her voice. Nor did Medenham help to
smooth the path for Mrs. Devar by saying quietly:
"In the meantime, Miss Vanrenen, the information stored in those
little red books is growing rusty."
She settled the dispute at once by asking her companion which side of
the car she preferred, and the other woman was compelled to say
graciously that she really had no choice in the matter, but, to avoid
further delay, would take the left-hand seat. Cynthia followed, and
Medenham, still ready to deal harshly with Marigny if necessary,
adjusted their rugs, saw to the safe disposal of the camera, and
closed the door.
At that instant, the hall-porter hurried down the steps.
"Beg pardon, mum," he said to Mrs. Devar, thrusting an open telegram
between Medenham and Cynthia, "but there's one word here----"
She snatched the form angrily from his outstretched hand.
"Which one?" she asked.
"The word after----"
"Come round this side. You are incommoding Miss Vanrenen."
The man obeyed. With the curious fatality which attends such
incidents, even among well-bred people, not a word was spoken by any
of the others. To all seeming, Mrs. Devar's cramped handwriting might
have concealed some secret of gravest import to each person present.
It was not really so thrilling when heard.
"That is 'Raven,' plain enough I should think," she snapped.
"Thank you, mum. 'The Raven, Shrewsbury,'" read the hall-porter.
Medenham caught Marigny's eye. He was minded to laugh outright, but
forebore. Then he sprang into his seat, and the car curled in quick
semicircle and climbed the hill to the left, while the Frenchman,
surprised by this rapid movement, signaled frantically to Mrs. Devar,
nodding farewell, that they had taken the wrong road.
"Not at all," explained Medenham. "I want you to see the Clifton
Suspension Bridge, which is a hundred feet higher in the air than the
Brooklyn Bridge."
"I'm sure it isn't," cried Cynthia indignantly. "The next thing you
will tell me is that the Thames is wider than the Hudson."
"So it is, at an equal distance from the sea."
"Well, trot out your bridge. Seeing is believing, all the time."
But Cynthia had yet to learn the exceeding wisdom of Ezekiel when he
wrote of those "which have eyes to see, and see not," for never was
optical delusion better contrived than the height above water level of
the fairylike structure that spans the Avon below Bristol. The reason
is not far to seek. The mind is not prepared for the imminence of the
swaying roadway that leaps from side to side of that tremendous gorge.
On either crest are pleasant gardens, pretty houses, tree-shaded
paths, and the opposing precipices are so prompt in their sheer fall
that the eye insensibly rests on the upper level and refuses to dwell
on the river far beneath.
So Cynthia was charmed but not convinced, and Medenham himself could
scarce believe his recollection that the tops of the towers of the far
larger bridge at Brooklyn would be only twenty-six feet higher than
the roadway at Clifton. Mrs. Devar, of course, showed an utter lack of
interest in the debate. Indeed, she refused emphatically to walk to
the middle of the bridge, on the plea of light-headedness, and Cynthia
instantly availed herself of the few minutes' tete-a-tete thus
vouchsafed.
"Now," said she, looking, not at Medenham, but at the Titanic cleft
cut by a tiny river, "now, please, tell me all about it."
"Just as at Cheddar, the rocks are limestone----" he began.
"Oh, bother the rocks! How did you get rid of Simmonds? And why is
Count Marigny mad? And are you mixed up in Captain Devar's mighty
smart change of base? Tell me everything. I hate mysteries. If we go
on at the present rate some of us will soon be wearing masks and
cloaks, and stamping our feet, and saying 'Ha! Ha!' or 'Sdeath!' or
something equally absurd."
"Simmonds is a victim of science. If the earth wire of a magneto makes
a metallic contact there is trouble in the cylinders, so Simmonds is
switched off until he can locate the fault."
"The work of a minute."
"It will take him five days at least."
Then Cynthia did flash an amused glance at him, but he was watching a
small steamer puffing against the tide, and his face was adamant.
"Go on," she cried quizzically. "What's the matter with the Count's
cylinders?"
"He professed to believe that I had stolen somebody's car, and
graciously undertook to shield me if I would consent to run away at
once, leaving you and Mrs. Devar to finish your tour in the Du
Vallon."
"And you refused?"
"Yes."
"What did he say?"
"Very little; he agreed."
"But he is not the sort of person who turns the other cheek to the
smiter."
"I didn't smite him," Medenham blurted out.
Cynthia fastened on to the hesitating denial with the hawklike pounce
of some barrister famous for merciless cross-examination of a hostile
witness.
"Did you offer to?" she asked.
"We dealt with possible eventualities," he said weakly.
"I knew it.... There was such a funny look in your eyes when I first
saw you...."
"Funny is the right word. The crisis _was_ rather humorous."
"Poor man, he only wished to be civil, perhaps--I mean, that is, in
lending his car; and he may really have thought you--you were not a
chauffeur--like Simmonds, or Smith, for example. You wouldn't have hit
him, of course?"
"I sincerely hope not."
She caught her breath and peered at him again, and there was a light
in her eyes that would have infuriated Marigny had he seen it. It was
well, too, that Medenham's head was averted, since he simply dared not
meet her frankly inquisitive gaze.
"You know that such a thing would be horrid for me--for all of us,"
she persisted.
"Yes," he said, "I feel that very keenly. Thank goodness, the
Frenchman felt it also."
Cynthia thought fit to skip to the third item in her list.
"Now as to Captain Devar?" she cried. "His mother is dreadfully
annoyed. She hates dull evenings, and the four of us were to play
bridge to-night at Hereford. Why was he sent away?"
"Sent away?" echoed Medenham in mock amazement.
"Oh, come, you knew him quite well. You said so in London. I am not
exactly the silly young thing I look, Mr. Fitzroy, and Count Marigny's
coincidences are a trifle far-fetched. Both he and Captain Devar fully
understood what they were doing when they arranged to meet in Bristol,
and somebody must have fired a very big gun quite close to the fat
little man that he should be scared off the instant he set eyes on
me."
Then Medenham resolved to end a catechism that opened up illimitable
vistas, for he did not want to lose Cynthia just yet, and there was no
knowing what she might do if she suspected the truth. Although, if the
situation were strictly dissected, Mrs. Devar's chaperonage was as
useful to him as the lady herself intended it to be to Marigny, there
was a vital difference between the two sets of circumstances. He had
been pitchforked by fate into the company of a charming girl whom he
was learning to love as he had never loved woman before, whereas the
members of the money-hunting gang whose scheme he had accidentally
overheard at Brighton were engaged in a deliberate intrigue, outlined
in Paris as soon as Mr. Vanrenen planned the motor tour for his
daughter, and perfected during Cynthia's brief stay in London.
So he appealed for her forbearance on a plea that he imagined was sure
to succeed.
"I don't wish to conceal from you that Captain Devar and I have fallen
out in the past," he said. "But I am genuinely sorry for his mother,
who certainly does not know what a rascal he is. Don't ask me for
further details now, Miss Vanrenen. He will not cross your path in the
near future, and I promise to tell you the whole story long before
there is any chance of your meeting him again."
For some reason, deep hidden yet delicately distinct, Cynthia
extracted a good deal more from that simple speech than the mere words
implied. The air of the downs was peculiarly fresh and strong in the
center of the bridge, a fact which probably accounted for the vivid
color that lit her face and added luster to her bright eyes. At any
rate, she dropped the conversation suddenly.
"Mrs. Devar will be growing quite impatient," she said, with an
admirable assumption of ease, "and I want to buy some pictures of this
pretty toy bridge of yours. What a pity the light is altogether wrong
for a snapshot, and it _is_ so stupid to use films when one knows that
the sun is in the camera!"
Whereat Medenham breathed freely again, while thanking the gods for
the delightfully effective resources that every woman--even a candid,
outspoken Cynthia--has at her fingers' ends.
The simplest means of reaching the Gloucester road was to run back
past the hotel, but the goddess of happy chance elected, for her own
purposes, that Medenham should ask a policeman to direct him to
Cabot's Tower, and, the man having the brain of a surveyor, he was
sent through by-streets that saved a few yards, perhaps, but cost him
many minutes in stopping to inquire the way. Hence, he missed an
amazing sight. The merest glimpse of Count Edouard Marigny's new
acquaintance would surely have pulled him up, if it did not put an end
to the tour forthwith. But that was not to be. Blissfully unconscious
of the fact that the Frenchman was eagerly explaining to a dignified
yet strangely perturbed old gentleman that the car Number X L
4000--containing a young American lady and her friend, and driven by a
conceited puppy of a chauffeur who suffered badly from _tete
montee_--had just gone up the hill to the left, Medenham at last
reached the open road, and the Mercury leaped forward as if Gloucester
would hardly wait till it arrived there.
The old gentleman had only that minute alighted from a station cab,
and a question he addressed to the hall-porter led that civil
functionary to refer him to Marigny "as a friend of the parties
concerned."
But the newcomer drew himself up somewhat stiffly when the foreign
personage spoke of Medenham as a "puppy."
"Before our conversation proceeds any farther I think I ought to tell
you that I am the Earl of Fairholme and that Viscount Medenham is my
son," he said.
Marigny looked so blank at this that the Earl's explanation took fresh
shape.
"I mean," he went on, perceiving that his hearer was none the wiser,
"I mean that the chauffeur you allude to is Viscount Medenham."
Marigny, though born on the banks of the Loire, was a Southern
Frenchman by descent, and the hereditary tint of olive in his skin
became prominent only when his emotions were aroused. Now the pink and
white of his complexion was tinged with yellowish-green. Never before
in his life had he been quite so surprised--never.
"He--he said his name was Fitzroy," was all he could gasp.
"So it is--the dog. Took the family name and dropped his title in
order to go gallivanting about the country with this young person....
An American, I am told--and with that detestable creature, Mrs. Devar!
Nice thing! No wonder Lady Porthcawl was shocked. May I ask, sir, who
_you_ are?"
Lord Fairholme was very angry, and not without good reason. He had
traveled from London at an absurdly early hour in response to the
urgent representations of Susan, Lady St. Maur, to whom her intimate
friend, Millicent Porthcawl, had written a thrilling account of the
goings-on at Bournemouth. It happened that the Countess of Porthcawl's
bedroom overlooked the carriage-way in front of the Royal Bath Hotel,
and, when she recovered from the stupor of recognizing Medenham in
the chauffeur of the Vanrenen equipage, she gratified her spite by
sending a lively and wholly distorted version of the tour to his aunt.
The letter reached Curzon Street during the afternoon, and exercised a
remarkably restorative effect on the now convalescent lover of forced
strawberries. Lady St. Maur ordered her carriage, and was driven in a
jiffy to the Fairholme mansion in Cavendish Square, where she and her
brother indulged in the most lugubrious opinions as to the future of
"poor George." They assumed that he would fall an easy prey to the
wiles of a "designing American." Neither of them had met many citizens
of the United States, and each shared to the fullest extent the common
British dislike of every person and every thing that is new and
strange, so they had visions of a Countess of Fairholme who would
speak in the weird tongue of Chicago, whose name would be "Mamie," who
would call the earl "poppa number two," and prefix every utterance
with "Say," or "My land!"
Both brother and sister had laughed many a time at the stage version
of a Briton as presented in Paris, but they forgot that the average
Englishman's conception of the average American is equally ludicrous
in its blunders. In devising means "to save George" they flew into a
panic. Lady St. Maur telegraphed a frantic appeal to Lady Porthcawl
for information, but "dear Millicent" took thought, saw that she was
already sufficiently committed, and caused her maid to reply that she
had left Bournemouth for the weekend.
A telegram to the hotel manager produced more definite news. Cynthia,
providing against the receipt of any urgent message from her father,
had given the College Green Hotel as her address for the night; but
this intelligence arrived too late to permit of the Earl's departure
till next morning. Lady Porthcawl's hint that the "devoted George was
traveling incognito" prevented the use of wire or post. If the
infatuated viscount were to be brought to reason there was nothing for
it but that the Earl should hurry to Bristol by an early train next
morning. He did hurry, and arrived five minutes too late.
Marigny, of course, saw that lightning had darted from a summer sky.
If the despised chauffeur had proved such a tough opponent, what would
happen now that he turned out to be a sprig of the aristocracy? He
guessed at once that the Earl of Fairholme appraised Cynthia Vanrenen
by the Devar standard. He knew that five minutes in Cynthia's company
would alter this doughty old gentleman's views so greatly that his
present fury would give place to idolatry. No matter what the cost,
they two must not meet, and it was very evident that if Hereford were
mentioned as the night's rendezvous, the Earl would proceed there by
the next train.
What was to be done? He decided promptly. Lifting his hat, and
offering Lord Fairholme his card, he made up his mind to lie, and lie
speciously, with circumstantial detail and convincing knowledge.
"I happened to meet the Vanrenens in Paris," he said. "Business
brought me here, and I was surprised to see Miss Vanrenen without her
father. You will pardon my reference to your son, I am sure. His
attitude is explicable now. He resented my offer of friendly
assistance to the young lady. Perhaps he thought she might avail
herself of it."
"Assistance? What is the matter?"
"She had arranged for a car to meet her here. As it was not
forthcoming, she altered her plans for a tour of Oxford, Kenilworth,
and Warwick, and has gone in Viscount--Viscount----"
"Medenham's."
"Ah, yes--I did not catch the name precisely--in your son's car to
London."
By this time Lord Fairholme had ascertained the Frenchman's
description, and he was sufficiently well acquainted with the Valley
of the Loire to recollect the Chateau Marigny as a house of some
importance.
"I beg your pardon, Monsieur le Comte, if I seemed to speak brusquely
at first," he said, "but we all appear to be mixed up in a comedy of
errors. I remember now that my son telegraphed from Brighton to say
that he would return to-day. Perhaps my journey from town was
unnecessary, and he may be only engaged in some harmless escapade that
is now nearing its end. I am very much obliged to you, and--er--I hope
you will call when next you are in London. You know my name--my place
is in Cavendish Square. Good-day."
So Marigny was left a second time on the steps of the hotel, while the
cab which brought the Earl of Fairholme from the railway station took
him back to it.
The Du Vallon came panting from the garage, but the Frenchman sent it
away again. Hereford was no great distance by the direct road, and he
had already determined not to follow the tortuous route devised by
Cynthia for the day's run. Moreover, he must now reconsider his
schemes. The long telegrams which he had just dispatched to Devar in
London and to Peter Vanrenen in Paris might demand supplements.
And to think of that accursed chauffeur being a viscount! His gorge
rose at that. The thought almost choked him. It was well that the
hall-porter did not understand French, or the words that were muttered
by Marigny as he turned on his heel and re-entered the hotel might
have shocked him. And, indeed, they were most unsuited for the ears of
a hall-porter who dwelt next door to a cathedral.