“Monsieur André!” Fair, her mallet poised for the blow, paused long enough to bestow a distracting glance through her lashes, oddly at variance with her maternal tone. “You aren’t going to begin that kind of thing, are you?” Her laughter rang out, gay and lovely and mocking.
Young De Chartreuil smiled back at her—a not very convincing smile. She was the most enchanting creature that he had ever met, but her lack of discretion froze the marrow in his bones.
“Mademoiselle, one so charming is privileged to forget that one may also be kind,” he remarked formally.
Fair stopped laughing. “Oh, nonsense!” she returned abruptly, forgetting that one may also be polite. She hit viciously at the ball, scowling after it more like a cross little boy than a lady of Romance. “There—see what you made me do!” The astonished André met her accusing gaze blankly.
“I, Mademoiselle?”
“Yes, sir, you.” The tone was unrelenting. “I’m a great deal kinder than I have any business being,” she added darkly. “I certainly am. Sooner or later every single one of you turn on me like—like—vipers, and tell me that it’s not possible that I could have been so everlastingly kind and patient and wonderful if I hadn’t meant something by it. Goodness knows what you’d all like me to do,” she murmured gloomily. “Make faces and bark like a dog every time one of you comes near me, I s’pose. Where’s that ball? I wish I were dead.”
This time André’s smile was clearly unforced.
“Oh, no one in the world is droll like you!” he stated with conviction. “But no one. No, do not bark like a little dog—I will be good, I swear.” He shrugged his shoulders philosophically. “After all, if God had made you tender hearted you would spend your days weeping for the ones you broke. So this way it is best, is it not so?”
Fair beamed on him graciously. “Well, of course!” she assented with conviction. “And I’m certainly thankful that you see it. If you’d had about seventy-eight thousand soldiers spending their every waking minute telling you that they’d fade away and die if you weren’t kind to them, you’d see that the novelty of it would wear off a little. Wear off a good deal.” She gave the ball a rather perfunctory hit. After all, Fairfax Carter on the subject of Fairfax Carter was more absorbing than any game ever invented. She drew a deep breath and started off headlong on her favourite topic. “It’s perfectly horrible being a girl—and it’s a million times worse if you’re a—well, if you aren’t exactly revolting looking and are what the dime novels call an heiress.”
“It must, indeed, be hard,” agreed young De Chartreuil consolingly.