She stepped out on the terrace, and called to him. He stopped, and looked up.
“Do you want me?” he called back.
“Of course I do!”
She advanced a little to meet him, and offered encouragement under the form of a hard smile. Although his manners might be unpleasant, he had claims on the indulgence of a young lady, who was at a loss how to employ her idle time. In the first place, he was a man. In the second place, he was not as old as the music-master, or as ugly as the dancing-master. In the third place, he was an admirer of Emily; and the opportunity of trying to shake his allegiance by means of a flirtation, in Emily’s absence, was too good an opportunity to be lost.
“Do you remember how rude you were to me, on the day when you were sketching in the summer-house?” Francine asked with snappish playfulness. “I expect you to make yourself agreeable this time—I am going to pay you a compliment.”
He waited, with exasperating composure, to hear what the proposed compliment might be. The furrow between his eyebrows looked deeper than ever. There were signs of secret trouble in that dark face, so grimly and so resolutely composed. The school, without Emily, presented the severest trial of endurance that he had encountered, since the day when he had been deserted and disgraced by his affianced wife.
“You are an artist,” Francine proceeded, “and therefore a person of taste. I want to have your opinion of my sitting-room. Criticism is invited; pray come in.”
He seemed to be unwilling to accept the invitation—then altered his mind, and followed Francine. She had visited Emily; she was perhaps in a fair way to become Emily’s friend. He remembered that he had already lost an opportunity of studying her character, and—if he saw the necessity—of warning Emily not to encourage the advances of Miss de Sor.
“Very pretty,” he remarked, looking round the room—without appearing to care for anything in it, except the prints.
Francine was bent on fascinating him. She raised her eyebrows and lifted her hands, in playful remonstrance. “Do remember it’s my room,” she said, “and take some little interest in it, for my sake!”