'What do you know, for instance?'
'I heard of you when you were at Kofn Ford, near the Castle of Sagan,' she answered.
Rallywood was only human, and however moderately he may have returned Madame de Sagan's preference, he was fully aware of its existence. In those days on the frontier he had, rather from fastidiousness than principle perhaps, avoided her and her invitations whenever possible. But that was one thing; it was another to hear the matter coolly alluded to by the girl beside him. Involuntarily he drew a little away from her. His notions were founded less on actual knowledge and experience of women—for of that he had little—than gathered from that idealized version of the sex with which the right-minded male animal is usually furnished by his own mental and emotional processes. So far his intercourse with Isolde of Sagan had been limited to certain sentimental passages; the initiative lay with the lady, but Rallywood had once or twice been distinctly wrought upon by the appeals to his sympathy and pity. Now, however, looked at from a fresh standpoint, the one in fact from which Valerie viewed it, the subject became suddenly repellent, and he slid away from the discussion with another question.
'What has Unziar been saying of me? You have treated me differently since—that night.'
There appeared to be no need to particularize the night.
Mademoiselle Selpdorf understood both the first involuntary movement and the change of subject, and resented them equally.
'Anthony is generous, so generous!' she said with some warmth. 'I suppose it is an English trait to take everything and to give nothing in return. Anthony told me of all that took place in the Cloister of St. Anthony. Your action seemed to him so fine, poor fellow!—but not to me. You believed in your luck, of course, and took the hazard and won, leaving him hopelessly at a disadvantage. I should not have accepted the position as he did—I should have forced you to fight it out sooner or later! I had rather a hundred times have died by your bullet than lived to endure your triumph!'
Rallywood pondered this view of the matter before he spoke.
'I dare say you are right,' he said at last; 'at least, no woman could have been so generous to another woman as he was to me.'
'You are complimentary, Captain Rallywood!'