He laughed. "If I am thou for thee, were it not courteous to speak to thee in thy own tongue?"
She colored, remembering the lesson and her own shrewd guess at the lady's meaning, and how, as she was led to infer, to tutoyer, to say thou, inferred a certain degree of intimacy. "It is not fitting here except among Friends."
"And why not? In France we do it."
"Yes, sometimes, I have so heard." But to explain further was far from her intention. "It sounds foolish here, in people who are not of Friends. I said so—"
"But are we not friends?"
"I said Friends with a big F, Monsieur."
"I make my apologies,"—he laughed with a formal bow,—"but one easily catches habits of talk."
"Indeed, I am in earnest, and thou must mend thy habits. Friend Marguerite Swanwick desires to be excused of the Vicomte de Courval," and, smiling, she swept the courtesy of reply to his bow as the autumn leaves fell from the gathered skirts.
"As long as thou art thou, it will be hard to obey," he said, and she making no reply, they wandered homeward through level shafts of sunlight, while fluttering overhead on wings of red and gold, the cupids of the forest enjoyed the sport, and the young man murmured: "Thou and thee," dreaming of a walk with her in his own Normandy among the woodlands his boyhood knew.