“The strawberries are not good this year,” she heard Baron Trossart’s grumpy voice saying. “I am not surprised Miss Rovers doesn’t care to eat them.” She hastily returned to her dessert. “No, I must beg of you. Joris, bring this lady a clean plate.”
It was the strawberries, then, that interested her? So much the better.
“How I envy your father, Gerard,” continued the Baron. “It is two years now since we have been at Trossartshage. The fruit cannot bear the transport; we have tried both water and rail. But the cares of state, you know, the cares of state! A man sacrifices himself for his country, and his country repays him with ingratitude.”
This last sentence was an allusion to a recent article in a small paper which reproached the authorities—in this case Baron Trossart—with not having cleared out a canal before the warm weather came. Nobody ever complained of the ceaseless flow of nephews and brothers-in-law. That, as we all know, is a part of the constitution. Were it not so, the “eminent politician” would be a thing of the past.
“Papa,” interrupted Helena, wilfully, “please don’t be gloomy. I’m engaged.”
“Well, there’s cause enough for gloom in that,” he replied. “I’m as jealous of Gerard as”—he looked round—“as Mademoiselle Papotier.”
“Ah! do not speak of it to me!” cried the Frenchwoman. “I could slaughter Monsieur Gerard if I met him in war.”
“That’s the last place where you’ll meet me,” exclaimed Gerard, laughing. Helena had suddenly blanched.
“War!” she said. “How horrible! No, we will have no fighting. Juffrouw Rovers, would you have the courage to marry a soldier?”
Across Ursula’s brain flashed a vision of a dog-cart filled with uproarious malevolence.