No one knows better, and I told Walter how Angela managed in London. She reached there in the afternoon, instead of in the morning as she had expected. Something about the automobile had given out and they had finally to take a train from York. When she reached the hotel where she was to meet the Dudleys, she found a note telling her to follow them to Southampton as they were obliged to take the night boat. Angela immediately looked up trains and finding that the next train would be one hour too late for the boat, what do you think she did? She telegraphed to the Captain to wait for her! Did you ever hear of anything so delicious? Walter calls it a piece of American effrontery, but I call it quickwitted, don't you? Of course the Captain could not keep his boat waiting for any person of less distinction than the Queen; but by good luck (Angela is always lucky) the vessel was late in sailing that evening. The Dudleys, who were anxiously waiting for her on deck, saw her coming, just as the sailors were about to take up the gang-plank, and begged the Captain for a moment's delay. Of course Angela looked charmingly pretty as she tripped up the incline; and she never realized that her little telegram could be taken otherwise than seriously until she heard the Captain say to the first officer, as she stepped on deck: "She was worth waiting for, after all." At this the child was so overcome with confusion that she did not know which way to look, and evidently did not recover her self-possession during the crossing. Walter insists that she is still blushing over her own daring. If she is, it is vastly becoming to her, as I have never seen Angela look more brilliantly beautiful.
We are living in an atmosphere so charged with romance, that it would be positively dangerous for two unmated beings to join our party at this time. Miss Cassandra pays Archie and myself the compliment of appearing to be radiantly happy over Lydia's engagement, although I know that she drops a tear in secret over M. La Tour and his château. I tell her that this is not an entirely safe environment for her, especially as one of her old time suitors is in Paris; he met us at Morgan's this morning and has been dancing attendance on Miss Cassandra this evening, which last, Walter says, is a very disrespectful way to speak of the decorous call of a dignified Quaker gentleman.
However that may be, Miss Cassandra laughed gaily at my serious warning, and with a flash of her bright blue eyes dismissed her quondam suitor and my solicitude in one brief sentence:
"Thee is very flattering, my dear, and I admit that Jonah is an excellent person; but he is quite too slow for me!"
"That may be; very few people are quick enough for you, dear Miss Cassandra; but you must acknowledge that Mr. Passmore was not at all slow about calling upon you to-night."
It is really too bad to tease our Quaker lady; but she takes it all so literally and is so charmingly good-humored withal that it is a temptation not easy to resist.
We are making the most of our few days in Paris, as we leave here early next week. Lydia announced at breakfast that she felt it her duty, and she hoped that we should feel it to be ours to make a pilgrimage to St. Denis this afternoon.
"After enjoying ourselves in the châteaux of the Kings and Queens of France, it is," she says, "the very least that we can do to go to St. Denis and see them decently and honorably buried."
Miss Cassandra quite agreed with Lydia, and Archie, although he says that it is a ghoulish sort of expedition, would go anywhere with her, of course.
It is rather odd that none of us have ever been to St. Denis, not even Ian McIvor who lived in Paris for months while he was studying medicine. We set forth this afternoon in truly democratic fashion on top of a tram, on one of the double-deckers that they have over here, to Angela's great delight. A rather lively party we were, I must admit, despite the sobriety of our errand.