“For a full week I have known this fact,” exclaimed Ashley, stepping to the Lady Barbara’s side. “Unfortunately, I have seen with my own eyes proofs convincing even me that my Lord Farquhart is this highway robber. I cannot doubt it, but I have refrained from speaking before because Lady Barbara asked me to be silent, asked me to protect her cousin, hoping, I suppose, that she could save him from his fate, that she could induce him to forego this perilous pursuit; but——”
Lord Farquhart’s hand was closing on his sword, but he did not fail even then to note the disdain with which Lady Barbara turned from her champion. She hurriedly approached Lord Grimsby, who was looking curiously at this highwayman who he himself had had reason to think was the devil incarnate.
“I beg your pardon, Lord Grimsby”—Lady Barbara was still impetuous—“for this interruption of your fête, but, to me, it seemed unwarranted that this man should longer masquerade among you as a gentleman.”
She swept away from Lord Grimsby. She passed close to Lord Farquhart, lingering long enough to whisper for his ear alone: “You see I can forgive a crime, but not an insult.” Then, sending a hurried message to her aunt, she paced on down the room, her head held high, the damask roses still blooming brilliantly, the stars still shining brightly.
A score of officious hands held her cloak, a dozen officious voices called her chair. And my Lady Barbara thanked her helpers with smiling lips that were still pomegranate red, and yet the curtains of her chair caught her first sob as they descended about her, and it seemed but a disheveled mass of draperies that the footmen discovered when they set the lady down at her own door, so prone she was with grief and despair.
XV.
Lord Farquhart seemed to recover himself but slowly from the shock of Lady Barbara’s denunciation, from the surprise of her whispered words. At last he raised his eyes to Lord Grimsby, who was still looking at him curiously.
“I fear that I should also ask your pardon, my Lord Grimsby, for this confusion.” Lord Farquhart’s words came slowly. “My cousin, the Lady Barbara, must be strangely overwrought. With your permission, I will follow her and attend to her needs.”
He turned and for the first time looked definitely at the little knot of men that surrounded him. The women, young and old, had been withdrawn from his environment by their escorts. His eyes traveled slowly from one to another of the familiar faces.
“Surely, my Lord Grimsby,” clamored Ashley, “you will not let the fellow escape!”