With extreme aptness “Narses” shied at a rabbit frolicking in the lush grass, and indulged in a series of risky gambades that afforded Marguerite an opportunity of strictly attending to his misdeeds.
“A dangerous horse! Didn’t I say so? Why, you are quite pale!” scolded Basil, with astounding finesse, as for the second time “Narses” was forced back to his post. “But you manage him very cleverly,” he added. “As I was saying, I will be absent long.”
Marguerite probably did not judge it worth her while to comment upon this reiteration, and Basil, looking straight before him, went on:
“I want to ask you whether you were serious when you spoke to your father about keeping my—I mean Piotr—with you for a while.”
“I endeavor to be always serious when dealing with family questions, mon cousin,” she replied.
“Of course it is a sacrifice on your part, and it will be a—what shall I say?—an intolerable nuisance for Régis; but there’s no accounting for both your generosities.”
Marguerite, flicking a tiny bramble from her habit, shrugged her shoulders.
“Suppose you abandon these eloquent sentences for the time being?” she proposed. “There’s nobody under the furniture—the bushes, I mean—and if it is for me alone that you are going to such oratorical expense, I will excuse plain and unadorned speech.”
“What ails her?” thought Basil. “I’ve never seen her like this!” for he genuinely did not understand. “Very well then,” he resumed. “You wish to keep the boy?”
“Yes,” she said, simply.