“Why do you insult me like this?”
“Because,” said Aristide, “I’ve talked by telephone this evening with my good friend Monsieur Lepine, Prefect of Police of Paris.”
“You lie,” said the Count.
“Vous verrez. In the meantime, perhaps we might have a little conversation. Will you have a whisky and soda? It is one of my English habits.”
“No,” said the Count emphatically.
“You permit me then?” He drank a great draught. “You are wrong. It helps to cool one’s temper. Eh bien, let us talk.”
He talked. He put before the Count the situation of the beautiful Miss Errington. He conducted the scene like the friend of the family whose astuteness he had admired as a boy in the melodramas that found their way to Marseilles.
“Look,” said he, at last, having vainly offered from one hundred to eight hundred pounds for poor Betty Errington’s compromising letters. “Look——” He drew the cheque from his note-case. “Here are twenty-five thousand francs. The signature is that of the charming Madame Errington herself. The letters, and a little signed word, just a little word. ‘Mademoiselle, I am a chevalier d’industrie. I have a wife and five children. I am not worthy of you. I give you back your promise.’ Just that. And twenty-five thousand francs, mon ami.”
“Never in life!” exclaimed the Count rising. “You continue to insult me.”
Aristide for the first time abandoned his lazy and insolent attitude and jumped to his feet.