“She is probably actuated,” he concluded, “by a groundless fear that I shall resort to the Nonconformist chapel.”
Seven o’clock found him seated before his brightly furnished dining-table. The table was of deal, but it was covered with damask, decked with silver, and ornamented by the chambertin. The Duke had a fine appetite, and fell to cheerfully on Monsieur Alphonse’s creations; these were studiously rural in their character—Watteau-like confections. Monsieur Alphonse was dreaming of the Petit Trianon.
The cottage was not large; the sitting-room was in close proximity to the door. A sharp rap of somebody’s knuckles on the door startled him, just as he was finishing his first glass of chambertin. He was in demi-toilette—a dress jacket and black tie. It should be added that, although daylight prevailed outside, the blind of the window was carefully drawn down.
The knock was repeated—rather impatiently. “Frank!” called the Duke in a voice carefully modulated.
“I’m on my way, your Grace,” Frank answered, putting his head in at the door. “I merely waited to put on a blanket over my dress-coat. Monsieur Alphonse has got into bed. He looks very natural in his official apron, your Grace.”
“Good,” said the Duke. “Don’t permit the person to enter.” He smiled slightly as he regarded Frank, who had hastily assumed a red blanket, striped with blue, and wore his hair brushed up straight from his head.
The next moment the Duke heard the door of the cottage open, and one of the sweetest voices he had ever listened to in his life softly pronouncing the question: “Oh, please, are you the man Devil?”
“I really ought to have recollected to tell Frank about that little mistake of mine,” thought the Duke, smiling.
His smile, however, vanished as he heard Frank, in answer to the question, shout with extraordinary vigour: “Yahoo, yahoo, yahoo!”
“This will never do,” said the Duke, rising and laying down his napkin. “The fellow always over-acts. I said idiocy—not mania.”