“But that has all gone away.”
“I am glad of it, though I should not have said you nay. My Hermoine would have made a curious nun.”
“Yes, she will make a better bride,” purrs the girl, going back to her subject. “But I won’t tell you all about it unless you dine with me, and only after dinner. See! Your escort are dismounting. They have had a long ride. They are taking refreshment. Will not my lord have the same mercy for himself he gives his soldiers? Besides, you look ill, worried.”
“Not at all. There’s only one thing on my mind; the errand I came for, and that, though important, is not, I pray God, immediate.”
“Then stay to dinner. I gave orders as I saw you ride up to the house.” At this, clapping her hands, the curtains are drawn up, and the Duke, taking his daughter’s arm, goes into the pleasures of the banquet. Here for the first time since the night before, Hermoine sees the Countess, and looking in her eyes knows that oath, or no oath, in some way she will get word of what has happened unto my lord of Alva.
But to Hermoine’s delight Don Fernando Alvarez de Toledo, Lord of Alva and Duke of Huesca, spurred by curiosity, wishes tête-à-tête with his lovely child, and to the astonishment and rage of her duenna says very shortly: “Countess, I am glad to see you in your usual health. My daughter and I, having weighty matters to discuss, would be alone. Good afternoon, Doña de Pariza, I kiss your hand,” and he bows her to the door with stately Spanish etiquette; then says: “Hermoine, your story. Is it a jest about a lover, child?”
“No jest.”
“Tell me.”
“After dinner, papa; not until wine has made your heart a little softer. You have hardened it in Holland.”
“Not unto thee,” says my Lord. “Tell me, pretty one.”