"Mon Dieu! what a chance!" he exclaimed, cordially shaking Julius by the hand. "Imagine! I was just writing you a note, when you were in the house yourself!"
"Really?" ejaculated Batiscombe, in some astonishment. "How can I serve you—since I am here in the flesh?"
"By remaining!" answered Marcantonio cheerfully. "I was in the act of writing a very pressing invitation to you to stay a week with us, and thus to make up the most agreeable party of four in the world. Madame unites herself with me in the request, I am sure," added Carantoni, turning to his wife, who looked rather pale.
"Mais certainement—we shall be charmed," said Leonora, utterly astonished and confused by the suddenness of the situation.
She had herself thought how delightful such an arrangement would be—more than once. But coming so suddenly, from her husband, without her suggestion, it frightened her and did not seem quite natural. Her voice did not sound very cordial as she spoke, but it was sufficient, and her husband, being full of his idea, noticed nothing.
"You are very kind. It will really give me very great pleasure," said Julius, controlling his voice wonderfully.
For he, too, was taken off his guard. Marcantonio was delighted. It was such a wonderful piece of luck, he said, that Monsieur Batiscombe should have called at that hour.
"But come with me, if madame permits," said he, "and I will show you your room. You can send for your things in the afternoon."
Leonora was only too glad to be left alone for a moment, and the two men went away, Marcantonio rubbing his hands at the success of his arrangements for a pleasant week. With Batiscombe in the house the time could not fail to pass pleasantly, he thought.
There are some men who seem to be pursued by an evil destiny that continually forces them to do the wrong thing out of pure goodness of heart. From an innocent desire to make his household pleasant for his sister, and to amuse the wife of his heart, he had asked the man of all others whom the one desired to avoid, and the other ought to have been kept from, simply because he wanted somebody and the man happened to be on the spot. And the whole thing had originated in a laudable desire to see pleasant relations established between his wife and his sister, the two persons in the whole world whom he most loved. Poor Marcantonio! He was under an unlucky star.