“By sending her away—say to England. I will go to England also.”
“My own opinion is that you would fare no better in England than here. Aimée is a girl of spirit. She may be led, but driven never,” her father declared emphatically.
“But cannot you compel her to give up this man?” urged Rigaux eagerly.
“Have I not tried, for weeks and weeks? Personally, my friend, I don’t think you dance attendance sufficiently upon her, if you really mean to win her. She has been spoiled ever since a child, and likes lots of attention.”
Arnaud Rigaux’s brows narrowed slightly, for he at once realised that what the Baron said was the truth. He had certainly been deficient in his amorous advances, for, truth to tell, he had become so utterly blasé that few women nowadays attracted him.
“Yes,” he sighed grossly. “Perhaps you are right, Baron. Is she at home this evening?”
“She’s alone in the petit salon, reading, I believe. My wife is out at dinner with the wife of the Roumanian Minister.”
“Then, if there is nothing else for us to discuss, I will go down and spend an hour with her—eh?”
“Très bien,” acceded the Baron, while Rigaux, casting away his cigar, settled his cravat before a big mirror at the end of the room, smoothed his hair with both his hands, and left.
Passing down the softly carpeted corridor he paused before a door, and opening it entered, to find himself in a good-sized salon carpeted in Saxe blue, with white enamelled walls and gilt furniture of the style of Louis Quatorze. Over the elegant apartment was suffused a soft light, the source of which was cunningly concealed behind the wide cornice running round the walls, the electric glow being thrown down by the white ceiling itself.