‘For me?’ cried Vandeloup, eagerly, holding out his hands.
‘An’ for who else would it be?’ grumbled Archie, giving the letter to him—a thin, foreign looking envelope with the Parisian post mark on it; ‘did ye think it was for that black-avised freend o’ yours?’
‘Hardly!’ returned Vandeloup, glancing at the letter with satisfaction, and putting it in his pocket. ‘Pierre couldn’t write himself, and I doubt very much if he had any friends who could—not that I knew his friends,’ he said, hastily catching sight of McIntosh’s severe face bent inquiringly on him, ‘but like always draws to like.’
Archie’s only answer to this was a grunt.
‘Are ye no gangin’ tae read yon?’ he asked sourly.
‘Not at present,’ replied Vandeloup, blowing a thin wreath of blue smoke, ‘by-and-bye will do. Scandal and oysters should both be fresh to be enjoyable, but letters—ah, bah,’ with a shrug, ‘they can wait. Come, tell me the news; anything going on?’
‘Weel,’ said McIntosh, with great gusto, deliberately flicking a fly off the horse’s back with a whip, ‘she’s ta’en the bit intil her mouth and gane wrang, as I said she would.’
‘To what special “she” are you alluding to?’ asked Vandeloup, lazily smoothing his moustache; ‘so many of them go wrong, you see, one likes to be particular. The lady’s name is—?’
‘Katherine Marchurst, no less,’ burst forth Archie, in triumph; ‘she’s rin awa’ to be a play-actor.’
‘What? that child?’ said Vandeloup, with an admirable expression of surprise; ‘nonsense! It cannot be true.’