“The Abbé de Ronceray’s first penitent was a murderer—and the murderer, as you would call it, of Angus Macdonald. You are sharp of wit, Lady Betty; you can find out all about this from the Abbé de Ronceray, without his suspecting what you are trying to learn. Trust a woman to ferret out what a man has no mind to tell her!”
“Monsieur Bastien,” said Lady Betty, in the same quiet voice in which she had first spoken, “you have offered me several affronts during the last few minutes, but the last is the greatest,—as if I could be induced to follow your advice in the smallest matter in the world! I shall lay the matter before their Royal Highnesses, and you will excuse me for declining your acquaintance hereafter,”—and Lady Betty walked off majestically.
This threat frightened Bastien. Being a trickster himself, he did not understand the directness of a straightforward nature, and could not persuade himself that Lady Betty would do so daring a thing as to appeal to the poor royalties they both served; still, he was undeniably nervous about it. As for Lady Betty, she was in such a storm of rage that she scarcely knew what she felt; but after the first palpitations of wrath, she hit upon one thing which completely reassured her. De Bourmont knew she was Angus Macdonald’s sister, and would he, knowing there was a bloody grave between them, offer her his love? Never!
But it is one thing to feel sure, and another thing to be certain. She wished and longed, with an extreme yearning, that she could hear some one deny the story. Of course she would not condescend to take Bastien’s advice and ask the Abbé de Ronceray, and she thought it a sharp trick of Bastien’s to suggest that she should do this, very well knowing she would not. At all events, she would put it out of her mind and never think of it again. Of that much she was certain.
But of course she did not. She thought of it all that day. The thought walked by her side, and whispered in her ear, and lay down with her, and rose with her. Nevertheless, she did not once lose her courage, and resolving to show Bastien how little of a coward she was, that night she dressed her lovely form in the only splendid gown she had,—something white and shimmering,—and with her fair neck bare, and her eyes brilliant and restless, she looked so handsome in her glass that she was thrilled from head to foot with gratified vanity.
As she came daintily stepping down the stair, by the light of two candles in the lobby, she found De Bourmont waiting at the foot.
“Dear lady,” he said, “this is the night I go. The ship waits at Leith for the tide, and at midnight I take post to join her. And will you, as you promised, read the letter I shall leave for you?”
Lady Betty, blushing and trembling, made him a low courtesy, saying in a soft voice:—
“With pleasure.”
“And will you not kindly look out of your window on the courtyard at twelve o’clock, when I shall be leaving? And if I see a light there, ’twill be an illumination to my soul until we meet again.”