“Monsieur!” she cried, giving back, “I have never in my life been alone with gentlemen.”
“But Mr. Ritchie is a duenna to satisfy the most exacting,” said Nick; “when you know him better you will believe me.”
She laughed softly and glanced at me. By this time we were all three under the branches.
“Monsieur, you do not understand the French customs. Mon Dieu, if the good Sister Lorette could see me now—”
“But she is safe in the convent,” said Nick. “Are they going to put glass on the walls?”
“And why?” asked Mademoiselle, innocently.
“Because,” said Nick, “because a very bad man has come to New Orleans,—one who is given to climbing walls.”
“You?”
“Yes. But when I found that a certain demoiselle had left the convent, I was no longer anxious to climb them.”
“And how did you know that I had left it?”