Marguerite Delarue’s friends always thought of her and spoke of her as English, notwithstanding her French paternity. For her appearance and her temperament she had inherited from her English mother, who had given her also English training. Miss Delarue laughed at the forlorn dejection of Wellesly’s face and figure.
“My face is a jovial mask,” he gravely told her. “You should see the melancholy gloom that shrouds my mind.”
“I hope nothing has happened,” she exclaimed, with sudden alarm.
“That’s just the trouble, Miss Delarue. It’s because nothing does happen here, and I have to endure the aching void, that I am filled with such melancholy.”
“Surely there was enough excitement yesterday and last night.”
“Ah, yesterday! That was something like! But it was yesterday, and to-day the deadly dullness is enough to turn the blood in one’s veins to mud!”
“Then everything is quiet down-town? There is no more danger of trouble?”
“There is no danger of anything, except that every blessed person in the place may lie down in his tracks and fall into a hundred years’ sleep. I assure you, Miss Delarue, the town is as peaceful as the plain out yonder, and birds in their little nests are not nearly so quiet as are the valiant warriors of Las Plumas.”
“Oh, that is good! I am very glad, on my father’s account. He is so aggressive in his opinions that whenever there is any excitement of this kind I am anxious about him until the trouble is over.” She hesitated a moment, her lips trembling on the verge of further speech, and he waited for her to go on. “Mr. Wellesly,” she said, a note of uncertainty sounding in her voice, “you are not prejudiced by the political feeling which colors people’s opinions here. I wish you would tell me what you think about this matter. Do you believe Mr. Mead has killed Will Whittaker?”