"But I did though, and she refused me—she did, by Jove!" said Mr. Curtis, dolorously.
"What bad taste the girl must have," said Mr. Randall.
"You're another," said Mr. Curtis, fiercely; "she's no such thing! How dare you insinuate such a thing, Mr. Randall? There never yet was born a man good enough for her; and if you dare to doubt it, I'll be hanged if I don't knock you into the middle of next week—now then!"
Mr. Curtis was as fierce as a Bengal tiger. Mr. Randall threw himself into a chair, and laughed immoderately.
"My dear fellow, I cry you mercy, and most humbly beg Miss Emily Murray's pardon. I look forward some day to being acquainted with her myself, and if I find her all that you say, I shall consider the advisability of making her Mrs. Warren Randall."
"You be—shot!" growled Mr. Curtis, striding savagely up and down. "She's not to be had for the asking, I can tell you; and after refusing me, it's not likely she'd have anything to do with you. Mrs. Wildair—oh, darn it!—Miss Randall, I mean, when you see your husband, tell him his mother is very ill, and if he does not hasten home soon he will not see her alive. A precious small loss that would be though," said Mr. Curtis, in parenthesis—"a stiff, sneering, high-and-mighty old virago! Don't see, for my part, what Rich meant by ever having such a mother!"
One week later, Warren Randall and his sister were on board the Golden Arrow, en route for Merrie England. Fair breezes soon wafted them to the white cliffs of that "right little, tight little" island, and Georgia for the first time set foot on a foreign shore.
But now, in her impatience to rejoin and be reconciled to her husband, she would consent to make no stay; so they immediately crossed the channel into France, and posted at once for Paris. And there the first news they heard from the American consul was that Mr. Wildair had left a fortnight before for St. Petersburg.
It was a disappointment to both, a bitter one to Georgia, and Warren felt it for her sake. To follow him was the first impulse of both, and they immediately started for the Russian capital.