ARE YOU MY WIFE?
BY THE AUTHOR OF “A SALON IN PARIS BEFORE THE WAR,” “NUMBER THIRTEEN,” “PIUS VI.,” ETC
CHAPTER IV.
“Here you are, you naughty little maiden, gadding about the country when I want you to be at home to talk to me!” exclaimed Sir Simon, as Franceline burst into the cottage full of her little adventure. “Where have you been all this time?”
“Only to see Miss Merrywig, and then I came home by the fields.”
“And was any poor mortal lucky enough to meet you coming through the rye?” inquired Sir Simon facetiously.
Franceline didn’t see the point a bit; but she blushed as if she did, and Sir Simon was not the man to let her off.
“Oh! so that’s it, is it? Come, now, and tell me all about it,” he said, drawing her to a low seat beside his arm-chair, the only one in the establishment, and which his host always insisted on his taking. “You must let me into the secret; it’s very shabby of you to have got one without consulting me. Who is he, and where did you meet him?”
“One is Mr. Charlton,” replied Franceline naïvely; “but I don’t know who the other is. I never saw him before. Tell me who he is, monsieur?”