The effect of these words was instantaneous. The fair Julia's thoughts suddenly flew from prospective vengeance to present interests, and though the frown did not disappear from her brow, her eyes flashed eagerness now rather than anger.
"What nonsense is this?" she queried with a show of petulance. "I pray you, Cousin, speak with less imagery. The matter is of serious portent to me as you know—and also to yourself," she added significantly, "and I fear me that my poor wits are too dull to follow the circumlocutions of your flowery speech."
Sir John smiled complacently; he was quite satisfied that he once more held his cousin's undivided attention, and resumed his narrative with imperturbable good-humour.
"I crave your pardon, fair lady," he said, "but on my honour 'tis just as I have told you. My lord of Stowmaries, Lord Rochester and your humble servant did journey by coach to St. Denis, for we knew that thither was the bridal couple bound. We drove in the lumbering vehicle on God-forsaken roads all the way from Paris, and never in all my life did I experience such uncomfortable journeying. 'Milor the Englishman,' quoth Rochester as soon as his feet had touched the ground, 'is he abed?' For you must know that it was then nigh on ten of the clock and the hostelry of the Three Archangels looked as dark as pitch from within and without. 'Milor is upstairs,' exclaimed mine host who, of a surety, looked vastly bewildered at our arrival. He seemed like a man bursting with news, and as if eager to explain something, but we were too impatient to pay any heed to him at the time and ran helter-skelter upstairs in the wake of Lord Rochester who, as you know, is ever in the forefront in a spicy adventure, and who moreover was eager for another peep at the bride, whom he had greatly admired during the religious ceremony in the church. We none of us had any idea that anything could be amiss, and as I have had the honour of assuring you, our consternation was great when on entering the parlour we found Michael standing by the open window, staring moodily out into the dreary landscape, the room itself in total darkness, and—as we learnt afterwards—the bride gone back to Paris by coach in company with her father."
"Impossible," ejaculated Mistress Peyton, feigning surprise which of a truth she did not feel. What had been and still was a mystery to Sir John was clear enough to his fair cousin, and there was, it seems, some slight attenuation to Daniel Pye's monstrous delinquency. The letter, by some idiotic blunder on the part of old Pye, had reached Master Legros just a trifle too late, but it had reached him at last, and the infuriated father had contrived to reach St. Denis in time to snatch his daughter away from the arms of the adventurer—who thus stood prematurely unmasked.
"Impossible!" she reiterated the while Sir John like a true raconteur, having succeeded in capturing her interest, made an effective pause in his narration. He could not complain of her moodiness now, for she seemed all eagerness and agitation.
"True, nevertheless," he asserted quietly, "the bride was gone and Michael—left desolate—seemed inclined to act like a man bereft of his senses."
"How mean you that?" she asked.
"He had, it seems, fallen madly in love with the tailor's daughter, and had no doubt during his hours of loneliness been assailed with remorse at what he chose to call a shameful bargain."
Again Cousin John paused; his large, prominent eyes were fixed once more upon his cousin. Clearly there was an undercurrent of intrigue going on here of which he did not as yet possess the entire secret, for he had distinctly noted that at his last words the deep frown which had still lingered on Julia's snow-white brow now vanished completely, giving place to an excited look of hope. Something of the inner workings of her mind began to dawn on him, however, a vague, indefinable sense of what had gone before, what she had feared, and what she now hoped. Therefore he waited awhile, watching her eager, impatient face, the play of her delicate features, the nervous movements of her hands, ere he resumed with well-simulated carelessness.