Aunt Marguerite frowned as the young man declined the invitation to come to her side.
“Only be called a lap-dog again. Here Vic, let’s go and have a cigar down by the sea.”
“Certainly,” said Pradelle, smiling at all in turn.
“Yes, the room is warm,” said the host, who had hardly spoken all through the dinner, being deep in thought upon one of his last discoveries.
Harry gave his sister a contemptuous look, which she returned with one half sorrowful, half pitying, from which he turned to glance at Madelaine, who was standing by her friend.
Aunt Marguerite smiled, for there was certainly the germ of an incurable rupture between these two, and she turned away her head to hide her triumph.
“She will never forgive him for speaking as he did about the beggarly trade.” Then crossing with a graceful old-world carriage, she laid her hand on Madelaine’s arm.
“Come into the drawing-room, my dear,” she said, smiling, and to Madelaine it seemed that her bright, malicious-looking eyes were full of triumph. “You and I will have a good hard fight over genealogies, till you confess that I am right, and that your father and you have no claim to Huguenot descent.”
“Oh, no, Miss Vine,” said the girl, laughing, “my father must fight his own battle. As for me, I give up. Perhaps you are right, and I am only a Dutch girl after all.”
“Oh, I wish we were back in London!” cried Harry as they strolled along towards the cliff walk.