She looked at me spitefully. 'Ask my lady!' she said. 'How should I know?'
I returned her gaze, and thought awhile. Then I said coldly, 'I think it is you who are the fool, Fraulein. Take it for granted that what you tell me is true. Have you considered what will happen should my lady repulse him? What will happen to her and to us?'
'She will not,' Fraulein Max answered.
But I saw that the shaft had gone home. She fidgeted on her seat. And I persisted. 'Still, if she does?' I said. 'What then?'
'She will not!' she answered. 'She must not!'
'By Heaven!' I cried, 'you are on his side!'
She blinked at me with her short-sighted eyes. 'And why not?' she said slowly. 'On whose side should I be? My Lord Waldgrave's? He never gives me a word, and seldom recognises my existence. On yours? If you want help, go to the black-eyed puling girl you have brought in, who is always creeping and crawling round us, and would oust me if she and you could manage it and she had the breeding. Chut! don't talk to me,' she continued maliciously, the colour rising to her pale cheeks. 'I wonder that you dare to come to me with such proposals! Is my lady to be ruled by her servants? Has she no judgment of her own? Why, you fool, I have but to tell her, and you are disgraced!'
'As you please, Fraulein,' I said sullenly, stung to anger by one part of her harangue. 'But as to Marie Wort----'
'Marie Wort?' she cried, catching me up and mocking my tone. 'Who said anything about her, I should like to know? Though for my part, had I my way, the popish chit should be whipped!'
'Fraulein!' I cried.