The note they did not dare to show; but were obliged to confess to the absence of Rose, saying, tout bonnement, as Adeline called it, that they could not find her.
Rose not to be found! Madame de Nino was dining out, and Mam'selle Fifine was terrified out of her sober senses. In the midst of the hubbub that ensued, Julie, the head fille-de-chambre, put her head in at the door, and said, "The Honourable Mrs. Seymour."
At a time of less commotion they would have burst out laughing. Julie had been nurse in a nobleman's family in England; she had there become familiar with British titles, and was as fond of using them as she was of using her English. One day Ethel Daw's mother came to see her; a very fine lady, all flounces, and feathers, and gold chains. It was Julie's luck to show her to the salon; and she came to the schoolroom afterwards, flung open the door, and called out, "Mrs. Daw, Esquire." Julie did not hear the last of that. The girls called her ever after Squire Daw.
"The Honourable Mrs. Seymour."
With a sharp cry Eleanor started up, and flew into her mother's arms, sobbing convulsively.
"Oh, mamma, take me home! take me home!"
Mrs. Seymour was thunderstruck, not only at Eleanor's cry of pain, but at the change in her appearance. She had just returned from London. Mary Carr disclosed a little of the truth. She thought it best; and, indeed, was unable to evade the keen questioning of Mrs. Seymour. But Rose's note, with the information it contained, was buried in silence still. Mrs. Seymour took her daughter home at once; and there Eleanor told the whole--that Rose had really gone away with Mr. Marlborough. Mrs. Seymour folded her aristocratic hands, and distinctly desired that no further allusion to it should ever pass her daughter's lips, as it would not her own. It was a retribution on them, she said, for having trusted an "iron man."
Meanwhile, Adeline de Castella and Mary Carr kept their own counsel through sheer obligation: as they had not declared all they knew at once, they dared not declare it now. And Madame de Nino verily believed Rose had been spirited away to the skies.
It was three days afterwards. Mrs. Seymour sat in her drawing-room, the green Venetian shutters partially closed, and the blinds down, for Eleanor lay on the sofa quite prostrated. Mrs. Seymour was in a state of as much indignation as was consistent with her high birth and her proclaimed assertion that they were "well rid of him;" for, in spite of the "iron" drawback, she had grown to hug to her heart the prospect of this most desirable establishment for Eleanor.
Suddenly the door opened, and the iron man himself walked in. Eleanor struggled up from the sofa, and Mrs. Seymour rose in hauteur, all the blood of the Loftuses flashing from her light grey eyes. Then ensued a contest; each side struggling for the mastership; Mrs. Seymour refusing to hold commune with him, and Mr. Marlborough insisting upon being heard.