'Why?'
'I am the governess of these girls, and responsible for them.'
'Absurd—a governess, you! One might as well expect to see a queen or a professional beauty filling the post. Clever this governess dodge of yours,' he continued, with a kind of insolence peculiar to himself. 'I suppose these girls are your nieces—little decoy ducklings to play propriety? And how is our mutual friend, old Cad—I mean Lord Cadbury? Seen him lately? No answer? Quarrelled, I suppose—these things never last long; but you are as charming as ever. How bad of you to leave me as you did that night in the Café au Progrès!'
Alison called the children to her side and walked away. There was in her whole air and manner a conscious dignity that might have quieted the presumptuous coxcomb and roué who dared to address her, while affliction had touched her features with something in expression that was beyond even beauty; but Dehorsey was one of those men who had a total disbelief in any feminine purity.
'Where do you live, little one?' he asked, while deliberately following her.
Alison made no reply, but looked round to see if Archie was near. He was in sight, but an appeal to him just then would have been unwise, for, old though he was, Dehorsey would have felt the full weight of his walking staff.
'How dare you, coward that you are, to molest me thus!' exclaimed Alison.
'A rough word from such lips as yours,' he said, mockingly, but changing colour nevertheless; 'but as an old friend——'
'Friend!'
'Votre pardon, mademoiselle—acquaintance then.'