"I told my maid to telephone you I was going away."
"You couldn't make time to do it yourself, I suppose?"
"We rushed off suddenly; I'd hardly time to get to the station."
"You rushed off where, may I ask?" Van Degen still lowered down on her.
"Oh didn't I tell you? I've been down staying at Chelles' chateau in
Burgundy." Her face lit up and she raised herself eagerly on her elbow.
"It's the most wonderful old house you ever saw: a real castle, with towers, and water all round it, and a funny kind of bridge they pull up. Chelles said he wanted me to see just how they lived at home, and I did; I saw everything: the tapestries that Louis Quinze gave them, and the family portraits, and the chapel, where their own priest says mass, and they sit by themselves in a balcony with crowns all over it. The priest was a lovely old man—he said he'd give anything to convert me. Do you know, I think there's something very beautiful about the Roman Catholic religion? I've often felt I might have been happier if I'd had some religious influence in my life."
She sighed a little, and turned her head away. She flattered herself that she had learned to strike the right note with Van Degen. At this crucial stage he needed a taste of his own methods, a glimpse of the fact that there were women in the world who could get on without him.
He continued to gaze down at her sulkily. "Were the old people there?
You never told me you knew his mother."
"I don't. They weren't there. But it didn't make a bit of difference, because Raymond sent down a cook from the Luxe."
"Oh, Lord," Van Degen groaned, dropping down on the end of the sofa.
"Was the cook got down to chaperon you?"