“It’s a fine night,” said Martin.
“It is. But not one to hang about on a windy bridge. Come for a little walk, if you have time, and protect me against the dangers of Brantôme.”
Go for a walk with her? Defend her from dangers? Verily he would go through the universe with her! His heart thumped. It was in his whirling brain to cry: “Come and ride with me throughout the world and the more dragons I can meet and slay in your service, the more worthy shall I be to kiss the hem of your sacred grey velvet dinner-gown.” But from his fundamental, sober, commonsense he replied:
“The only dangers of Brantôme at this time of night are prudish eyes and scandalous tongues.”
She drew a little breath. “Thank you,” she said. “That’s frank and sensible. I’m always forgetting that France isn’t New York, or Paris for the matter of that, where one can do as one likes. I don’t know Provincial France a little bit, but I suppose, for red-hot gossip, it isn’t far behind a pretty little New England village. Still, can’t we get out of range, somehow, of the eyes? That road over there”—she waved a hand in the direction of the silent high-road, which Martin had lately travelled—“doesn’t seem to be encumbered with the scandal-mongers of Brantôme.”
He laughed. “Will you try it?”
She nodded assent.
They set forth briskly. The glimpse into her nature delighted him. She appreciated at once the motive of his warning, but was serenely determined to have her own way.
“We were just beginning an interesting little talk when you were called off,” she remarked.
Martin felt himself grow red, remembering the tightly pocketed bagman who took the stage while he searched for eleemosynary sous.