"Oh yes! I will take care of myself," Katherine said. "Indeed, I appear to be the only person I have left to take care of, thanks to your forethought. All good go with you, Dick."
It followed—perhaps unreasonably enough—that Richard, some five minutes later, drove round the angle of the house and drew the mail-phaeton up at the foot of the gray, griffin-guarded flight of steps—whereon Madame de Vallorbes, wrapped in furs, the cavalier hat and its trailing plumes shadowing the upper part of her face and her bright hair, awaited his coming—in a rather defiant humour. His cousin was troubled, worried, and she met with scant sympathy. This aroused all his chivalry. Whatever she wished for, that he could give her, she should very certainly have. Of after consequences to himself he was contemptuous. The course of action which had shown as wisdom a couple of hours ago, showed now as selfishness and pusillanimity. If she wanted him, he was there joyfully to do her bidding, at whatever cost to himself in subsequent unrest of mind seemed but a small thing. If heartache and insidious provocations of the flesh came later, let them come. He was strong enough to bear the one and crush out the other, he hoped. It would give him something to do—he told himself, a little bitterly—and he had been idle of late!
And so it came about that Richard Calmady held out his hand, to help his cousin into her place at his side, with more of meaning and welcome in the gesture than he was quite aware. He forgot the humiliation of the broad strap about his waist, of the high, ingeniously contrived driving-iron against which his feet rested, steadying him upon the sharply sloping seat. These were details, objectionable ones it was true, but, to-day, of very secondary importance. In the main he was master of the situation. For once it was his to render, rather than receive, assistance. Helen was under his care, in a measure dependent on him, and this gratified his young, masculine pride, doomed too often to suffer sharp mortification. A fierce pleasure possessed him. It was fine to bear her thus away, behind the fast trotting horses, through the pensive, autumn brightness. Boyish self-consciousness and self-distrust died down in Richard, and the man's self-reliance, instinct of possession and of authority, grew in him. His tone was that of command, for all its solicitude, as he said:—
"Look here, are you sure you've got enough on? Don't go and catch cold, under the impression that there's any meaning in this sunshine. It is sure to be chilly driving home, and it's easy to take more wraps."
Helen shook her head, unsmiling, serious.
"I could face polar snows."
Richard let the horses spring forward, while little pebbles rattled against the body of the phaeton, and the groom, running a few steps, swung himself up on to the back seat, immediately becoming immovable as a wooden image, with rigidly folded arms.
"Oh! the cold won't quite amount to that," Richard said. "But I observe women rarely reckon with the probabilities of the return journey."
"The return journey is invariably too hot, or too cold, too soon, or too late—for a woman. So it is better not to remember its existence until you are compelled to do so. For myself, I confess to the strongest prejudice against the return journey."
Madame de Vallorbes' speech was calm and measured, yet there was a conviction in it suggestive of considerable emotion. She sat well back in the carriage, her head turned slightly to the left, so that Richard, looking down at her, saw little but the pure firm line of her jaw, the contour of her cheek, and her ear—small, lovely, the soft hair curling away from above and behind it in the most enticing fashion. Physical perfection, of necessity, provoked in him a peculiar envy and delight. And nature appeared to have taken ingenious pleasure, not only in conferring an unusual degree of beauty upon his companion, but in finishing each detail of her person with unstinted grace. For a while the young man lost himself in contemplation of that charming ear and partially averted face. Then resolutely he bestowed his attention upon the horses again, finding such contemplation slightly enervating to his moral sense.