Mr. Hammond cast him a fulminating glance, but addressed himself to the Marquis. “My lord, his explanation leaves me horrified, I may say aghast, at the impropriety of your lordship’s behaviour. My instinct, sir, is to wash my hands of the whole affair. If I relent, it is out of no desire to oblige one whose mode of life is abhorrent to me, but out of compassion for the unfortunate young female whose fair name you have sullied, and in the interests of morality.”
Lord Rupert stopped swinging his eyeglass, and said indignantly: “Damme, I’d not be married by this fellow if I were you, Vidal. Not that I’m saying you should be married at all, for the thing’s preposterous.”
Vidal shrugged. “What do you suppose I care for his opinion of me so long as he does what I want?”
“Well, I don’t know,” said his lordship. “Things are come to a pretty pass, so they are, when any plaguey parson takes it on himself to preach a damned sermon to your face. Why, in my father’s time — you never knew him: devilish bad-tempered man he was — in his time, I say, if the chaplain said aught he didn’t like — and from the pulpit, mind you! — he’d throw his snuff-box at him, or anything else he had to hand ... Now what’s to do?”
The Duchess had come back into the room in a hurry. She is not there, mon fils,” she announced, not entirely without relief.
“What?” Vidal said quickly. “Not there?”
“She is not in the inn. I do not know where she is. No one knows.”
The Marquis almost brushed past her, and went out. Léonie sighed, and looked at Rupert. “I cannot help being a little glad that she has gone,” she confessed. “But why does she run away so much? I find it not at all easy to understand.”
Juliana, who had been sitting for a long time by the fire, staring into it, now raised her voice. “You don’t want Vidal to marry her, Aunt Léonie, but indeed she is the very one for him. She loves him, too.”
“ Eh bien, if she loves him I understand less than ever why she runs away.”