Joséphine and Jacques de Serval, whose enthusiasm for martyrdom had received so severe a check in the course of the Fraternal Supper in the Rue St. Honoré, had at first with the self-consciousness of youth adopted an attitude of obstinate and irreclaimable sorrow, until the antics of Master Harry Waite, pretty Sally's husband—jealous as a young turkey-cock of every gallant who dared to ogle his buxom wife—brought laughter to their lips. My lord Hastings' comical attempts at speaking French, the droll mistakes he made, easily did the rest; and soon their lively, high-pitched Latin voices mingled with unimpaired gaiety with the more mellow sound of Anglo-Saxon tongues.
Even Régine de Serval had smiled when my lord Hastings had asked her with grave solemnity whether Mme. de Serval would wish "le fou de descendre"—the lunatic to come downstairs—meaning all the while whether she wanted the fire in the big hearth to be let down, seeing that the atmosphere in the coffee-room was growing terribly hot.
The only one who seemed quite unable to shake off his moroseness was Bertrand Moncrif. He sat next to Régine, silent, somewhat sullen, a look that seemed almost one of dull resentment lingering in his eyes. From time to time, when he appeared peculiarly moody or when he refused to eat, her little hand would steal out under the table and press his with a gentle, motherly gesture.
§2
It was when the merry meal was over and while Master Jellyband was going the round with a fine bottle of smuggled brandy, which the young gentlemen sipped with unmistakable relish, that a commotion arose outside the inn; whereupon Master Harry Waite ran out of the coffee-room in order to see what was amiss.
Nothing very much apparently. Waite came back after a moment or two and said that two sailors from the barque Angela were outside with a young French lad, who seemed more dead than alive, and whom it appears the barque had picked up just outside French waters, in an open boat, half perished with terror and inanition. As the lad spoke nothing but French, the sailors had brought him along to The Fisherman's Rest, thinking that maybe some of the quality would care to interrogate him.
At once Sir Andrew Ffoulkes, my lord Tony and Lord Hastings were on the qui vive. A lad in distress, coming from France, found alone in an open boat, suggested one of those tragedies in which the League of the Scarlet Pimpernel was wont to play a rôle.
"Let the lad be taken into the parlour, Jellyband," Sir Andrew commanded. "You've got a fire there, haven't you?"
"Yes, yes, Sir Andrew! We always keep fires going here until past the 15th of May."
"Well then, get him in there. Then give him some of your smuggled brandy first, you old dog! then some wine and food. After that we'll find out something more about him."