“What do you mean?” returned Lamont thickly. “You don’t think I——”
“Had I a daughter,” declared Enoch, “I would not trust her in your hands. That’s what I think, and that’s what I came here to tell you to-night. You leave that child alone.” He shot out his under lip. “We manage these little affairs in America better than in Italy,” he cried, slamming his clenched fist down on the table, and, without another word, turned on his heel and strode out of the dining-room.
CHAPTER VIII
Rose Van Cortlandt was in her element. She had been spending her husband’s money indefatigably these last few days over the final preparations for her second musicale, which five hundred engraved invitations by Tiffany announced for the evening of February 3, at nine o’clock.
People as rich as the Van Cortlandts receive few regrets. The postman’s earliest whistle at the area gate of their mansion on Park Avenue this morning heralded his bag stuffed with acceptances in various hued and monogramed envelopes, which he was glad to unload to the second man, who handed them above stairs to the butler, who in turn shovelled them over to the French maid, Marie, who spilled them off the dainty breakfast tray and half-way down the palatial staircase of polished walnut and ebony, on her way to her mistress’s bedroom.
None of Rose Van Cortlandt’s women friends knew her as well as her maid. Marie had served her for eight years. There was no illusion left to Marie about this dark, slender woman, whom Sam Van Cortlandt spoiled, and whom half of New York society raved about—chattering over her beauty, her gowns, her superb figure, her neck, her arms, her shoulders, her jewels, her savoir-faire, the brilliancy of her dark eyes, the poise with which she carried her small head proudly, her smile, the clever way she managed Sam, the exquisite curve of her throat and neck, her shapely ears, her nervous, small hands, the pink nails polished like sea-shells—nothing escaped them. Marie knew more.
She knew Rose Van Cortlandt at close range; in illness and in health; knew her adorned and unadorned, gay or sad, peevish, petulant, and insolent, in a rage, or in tears; had cared for and handled all her clothes, all her jewels, her hands, her hair; had listened and survived through innumerable scenes—some with the servants, some with her husband; had often amused herself in divining the real reason of her mistress’s various moods, and, when in doubt, had carefully reread her letters.
That which others raved about, failed to fascinate Marie. Deep down in her Norman heart she pitied “monsieur.” He seemed to her like a bon garçon, the best of whose good nature had been trampled upon and stifled out of him by madame, and the weight and responsibility of several million American dollars. Had she had the control of monsieur and his money, she confided to herself, she would have saved them both. She would have intrusted Sam Van Cortlandt’s money safely to the Bank of France and not had it kicking around Wall Street, where the risk of losing it was as great as at roulette or baccarat. Neither would monsieur live in such an insane asylum as she served in—Ah! non, mon Dieu!—where every one quarrelled, from her masters all the way down to the furnaceman and the second parlor-maid. She would see that monsieur had a comfortable apartment in Paris, and a modest château, and some good shooting close to her own people in her rich, green land of Normandy, where the cider was pure, and where she knew how to cook a hare à la chasseur to perfection, and where monsieur could have some pleasure in life, and receive his friends and roar with laughter, and kick off his muddy boots before the fire with his good comrades over the incidents so amusing of the day’s shooting. They would go crabbing at Longrune, and to the market at Dosulé to sell their spare heifers and calves, and monsieur would lose that careworn, gray expression and grow fat and healthy.
Marie dreamed of these things as she ran her mistress’s pink ribbons, or pricked her strong Norman fingers while embroidering the initials of Rose Van Cortlandt’s maiden name on the satin-damask towels.
There were moments, too, when the tears welled to Marie’s fine gray eyes; moments when she regretted ever having seen America, its wages, or its society; moments when she wondered what had become of Gaston since he married the daughter of the Père Miron and set up a saddler shop of his own in Lisseux. Gaston had given her a thin, silver ring; she wore it still.