Leaving Wellington's Headquarters, Colonel Audley made his way across the Park to Vidal's house. Barbara was not in, and as the butler was unable to tell Colonel Audley where she was to be found, he went back into the Park, and walked slowly through it in the direction of the Rue de Belle Vue. He was not rewarded by any glimpse of Barbara, but on reaching his brother's house found Lady Taverner sitting with Judith, and indulging in a fit of weeping. He withdrew, nor did Judith try to detain him. But when Harriet had left the house he went back to the salon, and demanded an explanation of her grief.
Judith was reluctant to tell him the whole, but after listening for some moments to her glib account of nervous spasms, ridiculous fancies, and depression of spirits, he interrupted her with a request to be told the truth. She was obliged to confess that Peregrine's infatuation with Barbara was the cause of Harriet's tears. She described first the incident in the park ,feeling that it was only fair that he should know what had prompted Barbara's outrageous conduct.
He listened to her with a gradually darkening brow. "Do you expect me to believe that Bab is encouraging Peregrine's advances out of spite?" he asked.
"I should not have used that word. Revenge, let us say."
"Revenge! We need not employ the language of the theatre, I suppose! What more have you to tell me! I imagine there must be more, since I understand that the whole town is talking of the affair."
"It is very unfortunate. I blame Harriet for the rest. She quarrelled with Perry, and I have no doubt made him angry and defiant. You know what a boy he is!"
He replied sternly: "He is not such a boy but that he knew very well what he was about when he made advances to my promised wife!"
"It was very bad," she acknowledged. "But, though I do not like to say this to you, Charles, I believe it way not all his fault."
"No! That is evident!" he returned. He walked over to the window and stood staring out. After a slight pause, he said in a quieter voice: "Well, now for the rest, if you please."
"I do not like the office of talebearer."
He gave a short laugh. "You need not be squeamish. Judith. I suppose I have only to listen to what the gossips are saying to learn the whole of it."
"You would hear a garbled version, I assure you."
"Then you had better let me hear the true version."
"I only know what Harriet has told me. I am persuaded that had it not been for her conduct, which you know, was very bad, the affair would never have gone beyond that one unfortunate evening in the suburbs. But she cut Lady Barbara in the rudest way! That began it. I could see how angry Lady Barbara was indeed, I didn't blame her. I hoped her anger would cool. I think it might have - I think, in fact, it had cooled. Then came the Duchess of Richmond's party. I saw Lady Barbara look round the hall when she arrived, and I can vouch for her having made no sign to Perry. I don't think she gave him as much as a civil bow. There was a lull in the conversation; everyone was staring at Lady Barbara - you know how they do! - and Harriet made a remark there could be no misunderstanding. It was stupid and ill-bred: I know I felt ready to sink. She then told Perry that she wished to remove into the salon, saying that the hall was too hot for her. Lady Barbara could not but hear. It was said, moreover, in such a tone as to leave no room for anyone to mistake its meaning."
She paused. The Colonel had turned away from the window, and was attending to her with a look of interest. He was still frowning, but not so heavily, and at the back of his eyes she fancied she could perceive the suspicion of a smile. "Go on!" he said.
She laughed. "Worth said that in its way it was perfect. I suppose it was."
"He did, did he? What happened?"
"Well, Lady Barbara just took Perry away from Harriet. It is of no use to ask me how, for I don't know. It may sound absurd, but I saw it with my own eyes, I am ready to swear she neither moved nor spoke.
She looked at him, and smiled, and he walked right across the room to her side."
He was now openly laughing. "Is that all? Of course.. it was very bad of Bab, but I think Harriet deserved it. It must have been sublime!"
"Yes," she agreed, but with rather a sober face.
He regarded her intently. "Is there more, Judith?"
"I am afraid there is. As I told you, Harriett quarrelled with Perry. You remember, Charles, that you were in Ghent. It seems that Perry rode out with Lady Barbara before breakfast next morning. I believe she is in the habit of riding in the Allee Verte every morning."
"You need not tell me that," he interrupted. "I know. She appointed Perry to ride with her?"
"So I understand. He made no secret of it, which makes me feel that he cannot have intended the least harm. But Harriet was suffering from such an irritation of nerves that she allowed her jealousy to overcome her good sense; they quarrelled; Perry left the house it anger; and, I dare say out of sheer defiance, joined the party Lady Barbara had got together to picnic in the country that evening. The gossip arose out of being the one chosen to drive with her in her phaeton. I am afraid he has done little to allay suspicion since. It is all such a stupid piece of nonsense, but oh, Charles, if you would but use your influence with Lady Barbara. Harriet is in despair, and indeed it is very disagreeable. to say the least of it, to have such a scandal in our midst!"
"Disagreeable!" he exclaimed. "It is a damnable piece of work!" He checked himself, and continued in a more moderate tone: "I beg your pardon, but you will agree that I have reason to feel this strongly. Is Peregrine with Bab now?"
"I do not know, but I judge it to be very probable." She saw him compress his lips, and added: "I think if you were to speak to Lady Barbara -"
"I shall speak to Barbara in good time, but my present business is with Peregrine."
She could not help feeling a little alarmed. He spoke in a grim voice which she had never heard before, and when she stole a glance at his face there was nothing in his expression to reassure her. She said falteringly: "You will do what is right, I am sure."
He glanced down at her, and seeing how anxiously she was looking at him, said with a faint smile, but with a touch of impatience: "My dear Judith, do you suppose I am going to run Peregrine through, or what?"
She lowered her eyes in a little confusion. "Oh! of course not! What an absurd notion! But what do you mean to do?"
"Put an end to this nauseating business," he replied.
"Oh, if you could! Such affairs may so easily lead to disaster!"
"Very easily."
She sighed, and said rather doubtfully: "Do you think that it will answer? I would have spoke to Perry myself, only that I feared to do more harm than good. When he gets these headstrong fits the least hint of oposition seems to make him worse. I begged Worth to intervene, but he declined doing it, and I daresay he was right."
"Worth!" he said. "No, it is not for him to speak to Peregrine. I am the one who is concerned in this, and what I have to say to Peregrine I can assure you he will pay heed to!" He glanced at the clock over the fireplace. and added: "I am going to call at his house now. Don't look so anxious, there is not the least need."
She stretched out her hand to him. "If I look anxious it is on your account. Dear Charles, I am so sorry this should have happened! Don't let it vex you: it was all mischief, nothing else!"
He grasped her hand for a moment, and said in a low voice: "Unpleasant mischief.It is the fault of that wretched up-bringing! Sometimes I fear - But the heart is unspoiled. Try to believe that: I know it!"
She could only press his fingers understandingly. He held her hand an instant longer, then, with a brief smile, let it go and walked out of the room.
Peregrine was not to be found at his house, but Colonel Audley sent up his card to Lady Taverner, and was presently admitted into her salon.
She received him with evident agitation. She looked frightened, and greeted him with nervous breathlessness, trying to seem at ease, but failing miserably.
He shook hands with her, and put her out of her agony of uncertainty by coming straight to the point. "Lady Taverner, we are old friends," he said in his pleasant way. "You need not be afraid to trust me, and I need not, I know, fear to be frank with you. I have come about this nonsensical affair of Peregrine's. Shall we sit down and talk it over sensibly together?"
She said faintly: "Oh! How can I -You - I do not know how to -"
"You will agree that I am concerned in it as much as you are," he said. "Judith has been telling me the whole. What a tangle it is! And all arising out of my stupidity in allowing Peregrine to be my deputy that evening! Can you forgive me?"
She sank down upon the sofa, averting her face. "I'm sure you never dreamed - Judith says it is my own fault, that I brought it on myself by my folly!"
"I think the hardest thing of all is to be wise in our dealings with the people we love," he said. "I know I have found it so."
She ventured to turn her head towards him. "Perhaps I was a fool. Judith will have told you that I was rude and ill-bred. It is true! I do not know what can have possessed me, only when she came up to me, so beautiful, and - oh, I cannot explain! I am sorry: this is very uncomfortable for you!"
Her utterance became choked by tears; she groped for her handkerchief among the sofa cushions, and was startled by finding a large one put into her hand. Her drenched eyes flew upwards to the Colonel's face; a sound between a sob and a laugh escaped her, and she said unsteadily: "Thank you! You are very obliging! Oh dear, how can you be so - so - I am sure I don't kwow why I am laughing when my heart is broken!"
Colonel Audley watched her dry her cheeks, and said "But your heart isn't broken."
Harriet emerged from his handkerchief to say with a good deal of indignation: "I don't see how you could know whether my heart is broken or not!"
"Of course I can know, for I know mine is not."
This seemed unanswerable. Harriet could only look helplessly at him, and wait for more.
He smiled at her, and took his handkerchief back "Crying won't mend matters. I rely on you to help me in this business."
The idea was so novel that she blinked at him surprise. "How can I?"
"By behaving like the sensible woman I know you to be. Confess! Didn't you mishandle Peregrine shockingly?"
"Yes, perhaps I did, but how could he be so faithless. I thought he loved me!"
"So he does. But he is very young. In general, a boy goes through a number of calf loves before he marries, but in your case it was different. I expect you were his first love."
"Yes," whispered Harriet.
"Well, that was charming," he said cheerfully. "Only you see, this was bound to happen."
"Bound to happen?"
"Yes, certainly. You have not been very well; he has been left to his own devices, and in circumstances where it would have been wonderful indeed if, at twenty-three, he had kept his head. This life we are all leading in Brussels is ruinous. Are you not conscious of it?"
"Oh yes, a thousand times yes! I wish I were safely at home!"
"I am glad to hear you say so, for that is what, if you will let me, I am going to advise you to do. Go home, end forget all this."
"He won't go home!"
"Yes, he will. Only you mustn't reproach him just yet. Later, if you like, and still want to, but not now. He will be very much ashamed of himself presently, and wonder how he can have been such a fool."
"How can you know all this?"
He smiled. "I have been twenty-three myself. Of course I know. You may believe me when I tell you that this doesn't signify. No, I know you cannot quite see how that may be true, but I pledge you my word it is."
She sighed. "How kind you are! You make me feel such a goose! How shall I prevail upon Perry to take me home? What shall I say to him?"
"Nothing. I am going to have a talk with him, and I think you will find him only too ready to take you home." He rose, and took out his card case, and, extracting a card, wrote something on the back of it with a pencil picked up from Harriet's escritoire. "I'll leeve this with your butler," he said. "It is just to inform Peregrine that I am coming to call on him after dinner tonight. You need not mention that you have seen me."
"Oh no! But he is sure to be going out," she said mournfully.
"Don't worry! He won't go out," replied the Colonel.
She looked doubtful, but it seemed that the Colonal knew what he was talking about, for Peregrine, the card with its curt message in his waistcoat pocket, retired after dinner to his study on the ground floor. Dinner had been an uncomfortable meal. When the servants were in the room a civil interchange of conversation had to be maintained; when they left it, Harriet sat with downcast eyes and a heavy heart, while Peregrine making a pretence of eating what had been put before him, wondered what Colonel Audley was going to say to him, and what he was to reply.
The Colonel, who had dined at the Duke's table, did not arrive until after nine o'clock, and by that time Peregrine had reached a state of acute discomfort .When the knock at last fell on the front door, he got up out of his chair and nervously straightened his cravat. When the Colonel was shown into the room, he way standing with his back to the empty fireplace, looking rather pale and feeling a trifle sick.
One glance at his visitor's face was enough to confirm his worst fears. This was going to be an extremely unpleasant interview. He wondered whether Audley would insist on satisfaction. He was not a coward, but the knowledge of having behaved vey shabbily towards Audley set him at a disadvantage, and made him hope very much that the affair was not going to culminate in a meeting outside the ramparts in the chill dawn.
He tried, from sheer nervousness, to carry the thing off with a high hand, advancing with a smile, and saying with as much heartiness as he could muster: "Well, Charles! How do you do?"
The Colonel ignored both the greeting and the outstretched hand. He laid his hat and gloves down on the table, saying in a voice that reminded Peregrine unpleasantly of Worth's: "What I have to say to you, Peregrine, will not take me long. I imagine you have a pretty fair notion why I am here."
"I -" Peregrine stopped, and then said defiantly: "I suppose I have. Well, say it, then!"
"I'm going to," said the Colonel grimly.
Peregrine squared his shoulders and set his teeth. At the end of three minutes he was bitterly regretting having invited the Colonel to speak his mind, and at the end of ten he would have been very glad if the ground had miraculously opened and swallowed him. The Colonel spoke with appalling fluency, and in the most biting of voices. What he said was so entirely unanswerable that after two stumbling attempts to defend himself Peregrine relapsed into silence, and listened with a white face to an exposition of his caracter which robbed him of every ounce of self-esteem.
When the Colonel at last stopped, Peregrine, who for ,some time had been standing by the window, with his back to him, cleared his throat, and said: "I am aware of how my conduct must strike you. If you want satisfaction, of course I am ready to meet you."
This handsome offer was not received quite as Peregrine had expected. "Don't talk to me in that nonsensical fashion!" said the Colonel scathingly. "Do you imagine that you're a rival of mine?"
Peregrine winced, and muttered: "No. It isn't - I didn't -"
"You are not," said the Colonel. "You are merely an unconditioned cub in need of kicking, and the only satisfaction I could enjoy would be to have you under me for just one month!"
Peregrine resumed his study of the window blinds. It seemed that Colonel Audley had not yet finished. He spoke of Harriet, and Peregrine flushed scarlet, and presently blurted out: "I know, I know! Oh, damn you. that will do! It's all true - every word of it! But I couldn't help it! I -" He stopped, and sank into a chair by the table, and covered his face with his hands.
Audley said nothing, but walked over to the fireplace and stood there, leaning his arms on the mantelpiece. and looking down at the fire irons.
After a few minutes, Peregrine raised his head, and said haltingly: "You think me a low, despicable fellow and I daresay I am, but on my honour I never meant to - Oh, what's the use of trying to explain?"
"It is quite unnecessary."
"Yes, but you don't understand! I never realised till it was too late, and even then I didn't think - I mean, I knew it was you she cared for, only when I'm with her I forget everything else! She's so beautiful, Audley!"
"Yes," said the Colonel. "I understand all that. The remedy is not to see any more of her."
"But I shall see her! I must!"
"Oh no, you must not! I imagine you do not expect her to elope with you?"
"No, no! Good God, such an idea never -"
"Very well then. The only thing you can do, Peregrine, since the sight of her is so disastrous, is to leave Brussels."
A long silence fell. Peregrine said at last, in a dejected tone: "I suppose it is. But how can I? There's Stuart's ball tomorrow, and the Duke's on the 7th, and -"
"A civil note to Stuart will answer the purpose," replied the Colonel, with the tremor of a smile. "Your wife's indisposition is sufficiently well known to provide you with a reasonable excuse. If you need more, you can inform your friends that the recent activities on the frontier have made you realise the propriety of conveying your family back to England."
"Yes, but - damn it, Charles, I won't dash off at at a moment's notice like that!"
"A packet leaves Ostend on Monday," said the Colonel. "You may easily settle your affairs here tomorrow, and be off to Ghent on Sunday. That will enable you to reach Ostend in good time on Monday."
Peregrine looked at him. "You mean that I'm not to go to Stuart's tomorrow?"
"Yes, I do."
"I ought at least to take my leave of Lady Barbara."
"I will convey your apologies to her."
Another silence fell. Peregrine got up. "Very well. You are right, of course. I have been a fool. Only - you must know - how it is when she smiles at one. It - never - oh, well!"
The Colonel walked over to the table, and picked up his hat and gloves. "Yes, I know. But don't begin to think yourself in love with her, Perry. You're not."
"No. Of course not," said Peregrine, trying to speak cheerfully.
The Colonel held out his hand. "I daresay I sharnt see you tomorrow, so I'll say goodbye now."
Peregrine gripped his hand. "Goodbye. You're damned good fellow, Charles, and I'm devilish sorry! i - I wish you very happy. She never thought of me, you know."
"Thank you! Very handsome of you," said the Colonel, with a smile. "My compliments to Lady Taverner, by the way. Don't forget to make my excuse for not going up to take leave of her!"
"No. I'll tell her," said Peregrine, opening the door and escorting him out into the hall. "Goodbye! Come safely through the war, won't you?"
"No fear of that! I always take good care of my skin!" replied the Colonel, and raised his hand in a friendly salute, and ran down the steps into the street.
Peregrine went slowly upstairs to the salon. He had probably never been so unhappy in his life. Harriet was seated by the window, with some sewing in her hands. They looked at one another. Peregrine's lip quivered. He did not know what to say to her, or how to reassure her when his own heart felt like lead in his chest. All that came into his head to say was her name, spoken in an uncertain voice.
She saw suddenly that he was looking ashamed and miserable. The cause receded in her mind; it was not forgotten, it would never, perhaps, be forgotten, but it became a thing of secondary importance before the more pressing need to comfort him. She perceived that he was no older than his own son, as much in need of her reassurance as that younger Perry, when he had been naughty, and was sorry. She got up, throwing her stitchery aside, and went to Peregrine, and put her arms round him. "Yes, Perry. It's no matter. It doesn't signify. I was silly."
He clasped her to him; his head went down on her shoulder; he whispered: "I'm sorry, Harry. I don't know what -"
"Yes." She stoked his hair caressingly. The thought of Barbara no longer troubled her. A deeper grief, whichshe would never speak of, was the discovery that Peregrine was not a rock of strength for her to lean on, not a hero to be worshipped, but only a handsome, beloved boy who went swaggering bravely forth, but needed her to pick him up when he fell and hurt himself. She put the knowledge away from her. His abasement made her uncomfortable; even though she knew it to be make-believe he must be set on his pedestal again. She said: "Yes, we'll go home. But how will we settle our affairs here? Will it not take some time?"
He raised his head. "No. I'll see to everything. You have only to pack your trunks. There is a packet leaving Ostend on Monday."
"This house! Our passages! How shall we manage?"
"Don't worry: I'll do it all!
He was climbing back on to the pedestal; they would not speak of this incident again; they would pretend each one of them, that it had not happened. In the end Peregrine would believe that it had not, and Harriette would pretend, even to herself, because there were some truths it was better not to face.
Judith, anxiously awaiting the result of the Colonel's interview with his brother, could scarcely believe him when he told her curtly that the Taverners were leaving Brussels. She exclaimed: "You don't mean it! I had not though it to be possible! What can you have said constrain him?"
"There was no other course to follow. He was fully sensible of it."
He spoke rather harshly. She said in a pleading tongue "Do not be too angry with him, Charles! He is so young."
"You are mistaken: I am not angry with him. I am excessively sorry for him, poor devil!"
"I am persuaded he will soon recover."
"Oh yes! But that one so near to me should have caused this unhappiness -" He checked himself.
"If it had not been Lady Barbara it would have been another, I daresay."
He was silent, and she did not like to pursue the topic. Worth presently came in, followed by the butler with the tea tray, and Judith was glad to see the Colonel rouse himself from a mood of abstraction, and join with all his usual cheerfulness in the ordinary commonplace talk of every day.
He did not go out again that evening, nor, next morning, was his horse saddled for an early ride. The Sky was overcast, and a thin rain was falling. It stopped later, and by noon the sun was shining, but a press of work at Headquarters kept the Colonel busy all the morning.
In the afternoon there was a review in the Allee Verte of the English, Scottish, and Hanoverian troops ,quartered in and about Brussels. These constituted the reserve of the Army, and included the 5th Division, Destined for the command of Sir Thomas Picton. They were crack troops, and the crowd of onlookers, watching them march past, felt that with such men as these to defend them there could be no need for even the most timorous to fly for safety to the coast.
"Some of our best regiments," said the Duke, as they went past him.
There was good Sir James Kempt's brigade, four proud regiments: the Slashers, the 32nd, the Cameron Highlanders, and the 1st battalion of the 95th riflemen, in their dark green uniforms and their jauntyccaps.
There was fiery Sir Denis Pack, with his choleric eye, and his heavily arched brows, at the head of the highland brigade. The Belgians began to cheer, for the kilt never lost its fascination for them, and in this 9th brigade was only one English regiment. The Royal Scots went by with pipes playing, followed by Macara, with his 42nd Royal Highlanders, and by handsome John Cameron of Fassiefern, with the 92nd: the Gay Gordons. The cheering broke out again and again; small boys, clinging to their fathers' hands, shouted: "Jupes! Jupes! Jupes!" in an ecstasy of delight; hats were waved, handkerchiefs fluttered; and when the last of the kilts and the tall hats with their nodding plume had gone by, it was felt that the best of the review was over. Colonel von Vincke's Hanoverians excited little enthusiasm, but the Duke, as he watched them march past, said in his terse fashion: "Those are good troops. too - or they will be, when I get good officers into them."
The British ambassador's ball had been fixed to take place in the evening, and the Duke was entertaining a party at dinner before attending it. The Prince of Orange rode in from his Headquarters at Braine-le-Comte in high spirits, and full of news from the frontier; several divisional commanders were present. and the usual corps of foreign diplomats attached to the Anglo-Allied Army. The conversation related almost entirely to the approaching war, and was conducted. out of deference to the foreigners, in firm British-French by everyone but Sir Colin Campbell, who. having, to the Duke's unconcealed amusement, made three gaffes, relapsed into defiant English, and relied on Colonel Audley to translate such of his remarks as he wished to be made public.
The evening was considerably advanced when the dinner party broke up, and the Duke and his guest were almost the last to arrive at Sir Charles Stuart's house. A cotillion was being danced; Colonel Audley saw Barbara, partnered by the Comte de Lavisse; and her two brothers: Harry with one of the Lennox girls and George with Miss Elizabeth Conynghame. Miss Devenish was not dancing, but stood a little way away, beside Lady Worth. The Colonel soon went to them, claimed both their hands for dances, and stood with them for some moments, watching the progress of the cotillion. Catching sight of him Barbara kissed her fan to him. He responded with a smile, and a wave of the hand, and without any appearance of constraint. Judith could not but wonder at it, and was reflecting upon the unfairness of its having been Peregrine who had borne all the blame, when the Duke's voice, speaking directly behind her, made her turn her head involuntarily.
"Oh yes!" he was saying, in his decided way. "The French Army is without doubt a wonderful machine. Now, I make my campaigns with ropes. If anything goes wrong, I tie a knot, and go on."
"What is the most difficult thing in war, Duke?" someone asked him idly.
"To know when to retreat, and to dare to do it!" he replied, without hesitation. He saw Judith looking at him, and stepped up to her. "How d'ye do? I'm very glad to see you. But you are not dancing! That won't do."
"No, for I arrived when the cotillion was already formed. May I present to your Grace one who has long desired that honour? - Miss Devenish!" Blushing, and torn between delight and confusion, Lucy made her curtsy. The Duke shook hands with her, saying with a laugh: "It's a fine thing to be a great man, it not? Very happy to make Miss Devenish's aquaintance. But what is all this standing-about? Don't tell me that there is no young fellow wishing to lead you out, for I shan't believe you!"
"No indeed, there are a great many!" replied Judith, smiling. "But the thing is that Miss Devenish, like me, arrived too late to take part in this set. You will not see her standing about again tonight, I assure you."
"That's right! Always dance while you may."
"How long will that be, Duke?" enquired Judith.
"Oh, now you are asking me more than I can tell you! For as long as you please, I daresay."
He nodded, and passed on. The cotillion came to an end soon after, and as Barbara walked off the floor Colonel Audley went forward to meet her.
She held out her hand to him. "Wretch! Do you know how confoundedly late you are?"
"Yes. Have you kept my waltzes?"
"Oh, I am in a charming humour! You may have as many as you please."
"All, then. How do you do, Lavisse? How do you go on in your neighbourhood?"
The Count shrugged. "Oh, parbleu! We watch the frontier, and grow excited at the mere changing of an advance guard. And you? What news have you?"
"Very little. We hear of the Russians approaching Frankfort, and of General Kruse being at Maestrich: Hallo, Harry! More leave?"
Lord Harry Alastair had come up to them, and replied to this quizzing remark with a grin and a wink . Having decided upon first meeting him that Audley was a very good sort of a fellow, he had lost no time is making him feel one of the family. He had several times borrowed money from him, which, however, he generally remembered to pay back, soon treated him with affectionate respect, and had even asked his advice on the conduct of an alarming affair with a Belgian lady of easy virtue. The Colonel's advice had been so sound that his lordship declared he owed his preservation to him and opined darkly that Audley must have learned a thing or two worth knowing in Spain.
Barbara coolly referred to this affair, enquiring: "How is the opulent Julie, Harry?"
"Lord, didn't I tell you? I got clear away. It was a near thing, I can tell you. All Charles's doing. He's a man of wide experience, Bab, I warn you!"
"Charles, how shocking! Spanish beauties?"
"Dozens of them!" said the Colonel.
"Depraved! What is this they are striking up? A waltz! I am yours, then."
He led her on to the floor. She gave a sigh as his arm encircled her waist. He heard it, and glanced down at her. "Why the sigh, Bab?"
"I don't know. I think it was voluptuous."
He laughed. "Abominable word!"
"You dance so delightfully!" she murmured. "Where have you been hiding these last days?"
"At Headquarters, when I was not laming my horses on these shocking roads. By the by, had you to create a scandal in my family?"
"It seemed as though I had to," she admitted. "Did it some to your ears?"
"Every word of it. You stirred up a great deal of unhappiness, Bab."
"What, by permitting poor bored Perry to gain little experience? Nonsense! I behaved charmingly him. Oh, you are recalling that I said I would be a sister to him! Well, so I was, until his ridiculous wife chose to challenge me. I won that encounter, however, and will sheathe my sword now, if you like."
"I wish you had never drawn it, Bab. Lady Taverner wasn't a worthy foe."
"Ah, that's charming of you! Well, I will engage to get him out of my clutches. I don't see him tonight: is he not coming?"
"No. He is going back to England."
"Going back to England? He told me nothing of this!"
"It has only quite lately been decided. Brussels does not agree with Lady Taverner. I am charged with a message from Peregrine: his apologies for not being able to take his leave of you in person."
She was staring at him. "It is your doing, in fact!" He nodded.
Her breast heaved. "Insufferable!" The word burst from her. "My God, I could hit you!"
"Why, certainly, if you like, but I don't recommend you to do so in such a public place as this."
She wrenched herself out of his hold, and walked swiftly off the dancing floor. He followed her, and took her hand, and drawing it through his arm held it them firmly. "Calm yourself, Bab. If you want to quarrel with me you shall. I daresay Sir Charles would be pleased to lend us his morning-room for the purpose."
"You are right!" she said, in a low, furious voice. "This quarrel will not keep!"
He led her out of the ballroom and across the hall to a small parlour. There was no one in it, but the candles had been lit in the wall-sconces. The Colonel shut the door, and remained with his back to it, watching Barbara with a grave look in his eyes.
She went with long, hasty steps to the table in the centre of the room, and there faced him. When she spoke it was plain that she was making an effort to control her voice. "I desire to understand you. Did you think I had fallen in love with that youth?"
"Of course not. It was he who fell in love with you."
She made a contemptuous gesture. "An affair of great moment, that!"
"It was an affair of very great moment to him, and to his wife."
"What are either of them to you?"
"Not very much, perhaps. That does not signify. I couldn't let you come between any husband and his wife."
"Unfortunate! It is one of my pastimes!"
He was silent, his mouth shut hard, his arms folded across his chest. She said angrily: "You have made me ridiculous! You dared - you dared to bundle Peregrine out of the country without a word to me! Do you wish me to confess myself in the wrong? Very well, I behaved after the fashion of my family, badly! But not so badly that it was necessary to set the Channel between Peregrine and my charms! As though I would not have given him up at a word from you!"
"You are unreasonable," he replied. "Was there not a word from me? I seem to remember that you promised to set all to rights. I trusted you, but you broke your word to me. Is it for you to reproach me now? You took Perry from his wife out of spite. That makes me feel sick, do you know? If I thought that you knew what unhappiness - but you didn't! It was mischief - thoughtlessness! But, Bab, you cannot undo that kind of mischief merely by growing cool towards the poor devil you've made to fall in love with you! To see you, to hear your voice, is enough to keep that passion alive: The only course for Peregrine to follow was to go away."
Her lip curled. "This is decidedly in the tragic manner! Well! It is at least comforting to know that the scandal Peregrine's flight will create will be of your making. But I have an odd liking for creating my own scandals. You will agree that I am sufficiently adept to require no assistance."
He moved away from the door, and came towards her. "My God, where are we drifting? Is that the sum of your ambition, to create a scandal?"
"Oh, certainly! Did I not inform you of it, two months ago?"
"You don't mean what you say. Don't try to make me angry too! This wretched business is over. There is no need to discuss it, believe me!"
"You know very well that there is. You have given me a taste of high-handedness which I don't care for. I dare say you would like me to cry meekly on your shoulder and promise not to offend again."
"I would like to believe that you had a heart!"
"Oh, I have, and bestow little bits of it here and there in a most generous fashion."
"Was I the recipient of one of those little bits?"
She grew white, and said abruptly: "There has been mough of this. I warned you - did I not? - that you were making a mistake when you chose to invest me with all the virtues. Let me advise you to try your fortune with Miss Devenish. She would make you an admirable wife. You might be as possessive as you pleased, and she would love you for it. You can no longer persist in thinking me a suitable bride!"
"Every word you say seems designed to convince me that you are not!"
"Capital!" She did not speak quite steadily, but the smile still curled her lips. "The truth is, my dear Charles, that we have both of us been fools. I at least I should have known better, for I had the advantage of you in having been married before. I admit that I was a little carried away. But I am bored now, confoundedly bored!"
"I envy you!" he said harshly. "Boredom seems a little thing compared with what I have had to suffer at your hands!"
"Your mistake! Boredom is the most damnable of all sufferings!"
"No! The most damnable suffering is to have your faith in one you love slowly killed. But what should you know of that? You don't deal in love!"
"On the contrary, I deal in it most artistically!"
"I have another word for it," he said.
"The devil you have! There, it is off at last! You may have perceived that I have been tugging at your ring for the last ten minutes. It should, of course, have been cast at your feet some time ago, but the confounded thing was always too tight. Take it!"
He looked at her for a moment, then held out his hand without a word. She dropped the ring into it, turned sharply on her heel, and went out of the room.
It was some time before the Colonel followed her, but he went back into the ballroom presently, and sought out Miss Devenish. "Forgive me!" he said. "I have kept you waiting."
She looked up with a start. "Oh! I beg your pardon. I was not attending! What did you say?"
"Isn't this our dance?" he asked.
"Our dance - oh yes, of course! How stupid of me"' She got up, resolutely smiling, but he made no movement to lead her on to the floor. "What is it?" he said quietly.
She gave a gasp, and pressed her handkerchief to her lips. "Nothing! nothing!"
He took her arm. "Come into the garden. You must not cry here."
She allowed herself to be propelled towards the long, open window, but when they stood on the terrace she said in a trembling voice: "You must think me mad! It is the heat: my head aches with it!"
"What is it?" he repeated. "You are very unhappy, are you not? Can I do anything to help you?"
A deep sob shook her. "No one can help me! Yes, I am unhappy. Oh, leave me, please leave me!"
"I can't leave you like this. Won't you tell me what the trouble is?"
"Oh no, how could I?"
"If you are unhappy I am in the same case. Does that make a bond?"
She looked up, trying to see his face in the dusk. "You? No, that cannot be true! You are engaged to the woman you love, you -"
"No, not now."
She was startled. "Oh, hush, hush! What can you possibly mean?"
"My engagement is at an end. Never mind that: it is your unhappiness, not mine, that we are concerned with."
She clasped his hand impulsively. "I am so sorry! I do not know what to say! If there were anything I could do."
"There is nothing to be done, or said. Lady Barbara and I are agreed that we should not suit, after all. I have told you my trouble: will you not trust me with yours?"
"If I dared, you would think me - you would turn on me in disgust!"
"I can safely promise that I should not do anything of the sort. Come, let us sit down on this uncomfortably rustic bench!… Now, what is it, my poor child?"