And Roger answered readily,—
“Yes, the Princess Michelle d’Orantia; she will make hay with a private gentleman for amusement, but she thinks him not her equal; so I go humbly in her suite to Orlamunde.”
Bess’s face did not clear. Her nimble wit told her that Roger meant to convey that Michelle was too highly placed for him to aspire to her hand; but that did not mean in the least that he might not love her desperately. Bess knew that it was quite possible to love beyond one’s station. She said nothing; but the rippling stream of her talk and laughter were stopped. And Roger, to carry the war into the enemy’s camp, said,—
“Perhaps, when I return, I shall find you married; that would not seem strange to the rest of the world, but it would seem strange to me.”
Roger could not part from any pretty woman without infusing a dash of sentiment into the parting.
“La!” cried Bess, suddenly recovering herself, “I wouldn’t marry a monsieur, unless he was to let me wash him all over, every day; for if he promised me he’d do it, as like as not he’d lie about it. I like a clean man, and ’tis the great fault of these French folks that they a’n’t in love with soap and water. You haven’t told me to keep honest; well, that mark I gave you on your forehead speaks for itself.”
“Truly it does, my dear. I never thought of telling you to keep honest.”
“And you will let me hear from you sometimes?”
“I will without fail. Go you to St. Germains, when occasion serves, and when you are a great singer, pay your respects to our King and Queen and little Prince.”
“That I will. The King, I take it, is a mighty foolish old person. First, he ran away from England without cause, and has been trying to get back ever since. But he is my King and yours, and nobody is a better Jacobite than Bess Lukens, and I hate the Whigs worse and worse.”