They were young, but, strange to say, in their instance, separation for a time, instead of cooling, strengthened their mutual regard; and when Flora spoke, the old familiar sound of her soft and beloved voice made the tender link complete.
She drew off her glove and smilingly held up a little white hand. There was but one ring on it—the diamond gift of Madame de Ribeaupierre, sent at a time when Quentin had no other gift to send; and the curious history of it afforded them ample conversation during dinner. As for Eugene, who sat opposite, he seemed immensely consoled, under his unhappy circumstances, by a blue-eyed and fair ringleted daughter of the Commissary General from Newport, that young lady's patriotic animosity to France seeming in no way to extend to a handsome young fellow in the green coat lapelled with white of the 24th Chasseurs à Cheval; so thus the daughter of "la perfide Albion" had it all her own way.
Then the old General and Madame de Ribeaupierre were, as Eugene phrased it in the French camp style, "like a couple of fourbisseurs," they sat with their powdered heads so close together; but they were deep in recollections of the old court of the Bourbons, of the Scoto-French alliance, of the days of the monarchy, all of which Eugene was wont to stigmatize as "the rubbish of the world before the flood," for he was one of those young men who wisely, perhaps, don't see much use in looking back at any time.
Lady Rohallion had, of course, innumerable questions to ask concerning Cosmo; but, kept so distantly aloof as he had been by that uncompromising personage, Quentin found great difficulty in satisfying the anxious mother. Then Lord Rohallion asked many a question concerning the old Borderers; but as Quentin's battalion had been the second, and was consequently a new one, he had some difficulty in satisfying all his inquiries.
Fresh from foreign service and the seat of war, whence some rather exaggerated stories of scrapes and perils had preceded him, Quentin experienced all the intense boredom of finding himself "an object of interest." This annoyance was all the greater, that he was absorbing and absorbed by Flora, the heiress, the general's beautiful and wealthy ward, who had already turned the heads of all the hard-up fellows in the adjacent garrison towns.
All things have an end; even the longest and most stately of dinners, so in due time the ladies retired to the drawing-room. As Madame de Ribeaupierre passed Quentin, her cheek was flushed with pleasure and gratified pride by the attention she had received from the courtly old lord—that noble pair d'Ecosse; her eyes were bright, and she still looked indeed beautiful.
"Ah, my child, Quentin, I can see what I can see," she whispered; "it is she whom you love, then?"
"Yes, madame, most dearly," said Quentin, smiling.
"C'est un ange! and I shall always love her, too!" exclaimed the impulsive Frenchwoman, as she kissed Flora's blushing cheek.
"Quentin, follow us soon," said the latter, tapping him with her fan; "I want to hear more about that Spanish lady at the Villa de Maciera."