[CHAPTER VI.]
VESPER SUGGESTS AN EXPLANATION.
"Glad of a quarrel straight I clap the door;
Sir, let me see you and your works no more."
Pope.
At twelve o'clock Mrs. Rose à Charlitte was standing in her cold pantry deftly putting a cap of icing on a rich rounded loaf of cake, when she heard a question asked, in Vesper's smooth neutral tones, "Where is madame?"
She stepped into the kitchen, and found that he was interrogating her servant Célina.
"I should like to speak to that young man I saw this morning," he said, when he saw her.
"He has gone out, monsieur," she replied, after a moment's hesitation.
"Which is his room?"
"The one by the smoking-room," she answered, with a deep blush.