Doom fingered the bristles of his chin in a manifest perturbation. “He—he did that, did he?” said he, like one seeking to gain time for further reflection. And when Count Victor waited some more sympathetic comment, “It was—it was very stupid, very stupid of Mungo,” said he.
“Stupid!” echoed Count Victor ironically. “Ah! so it was. I should not have said stupid myself, but it so hard, is it not, for a foreigner to find the just word in his poor vocabulary? For a bêtise much less unpleasant I have scored a lackey's back with a scabbard. Master Mungo had an explanation, however, though I doubted the truth of it.”
“And what was that?”
“That you would be angry if he permitted me to get into danger while I was your guest,—an excuse more courteous than convincing.”
“He was right,” said Doom, “though I can scarcely defend the manner of executing his trust: I was not to see that he would make a trepanning affair of it. I'm—I'm very much grieved, Count, much grieved, I assure you: I shall have a word or two on the matter the morn's morning with Mungo. A stupid action! a stupid action! but you know the man by this time—an oddity out and out.”
“A little too much so, if I may take the liberty, M. le Baron,—a little too much so for a foreigner's peace of mind,” said Count Victor softly. “Are you sure, M. le Baron, there are no traitors in Doom?” and he leaned forward with his gaze on the Baron's face.
The Baron started, flushed more crimson than before, and turned an alarmed countenance to his interrogator. “Good God!” he cried, “are you bringing your doubts of the breed of us to my hearthstone?”
“It is absurd, perhaps,” said Count Victor, still very softly, and watching his host as closely as he might, “but Mungo—”
“Pshaw! a good lowland heart! For all his clowning, Count, you might trust him with your life.”
“The other servant then—the woman?”