Both Caliphronas and Crispin arose with a simultaneous movement, and strolled across the room to look at this modern Captain Kidd, for that style of man he appeared to have been, judging from Mrs. Dengelton’s highly-colored description.
The portrait was a full-length one of a handsome young man in the old-fashioned costume à la d’Orsay of the early Victorian age, and assuredly he appeared to be a dandy of the first water. But his strong commanding face, his eagle glance, firm mouth, and prominent nose marked him at once as a born leader of men. A man who, in Elizabethan times, would have sailed the Spanish main and thrashed the Dons; who, in later years, would have delighted in Jacobite conspiracies; who would have fought his way to a marshal’s baton when Napoleon led the armies of France: in fact, one of those men who find no outlet for their energies in the leading-strings of civilization, but who, in a lawless life, develop those qualities whereof heroes are made. Maurice was good-looking enough in an ordinary fashion, but he had none of the power and daring in his face, such as showed so conspicuously in his uncle’s countenance.
The Count and Crispin remained looking at the portrait an unconscionably long time, considering the original was unknown to them, and glanced meaningly at one another as they went back to their seats.
“Your description is an admirable one, Mrs. Dengelton,” said Crispin, as that lady evidently desired his opinion of the portrait; “the face is that of a man who would be either a hero or a scoundrel according to circumstances, but always brave.”
“My dear Mr. Crispin!” cried the lady, somewhat scandalized at the epithet applied to a Roylands.
“I beg your pardon, Mrs. Dengelton; I am speaking of the type more than the man. Rudolph Roylands has the bearing of a born leader of men, and I do not wonder he left England for wider fields. He must have been stifled in this narrow island.”
“How do you know he left England?” asked the lady sharply.
“Why, your story of last night”—
“But you were not here when I told it. Ah, my dear Mr. Crispin, I am indeed very angry at you for taking my daughter out onto the terrace. She might have caught her death of cold—but we will not speak of that. At all events, you could not have heard my story.”
Crispin looked rather uncomfortable, as if he feared he had committed himself; but, as Mrs. Dengelton’s beady eyes were fastened shrewdly on his face, he had to make some answer, though, truth to tell, he did not know what to say.