‘My lord, indeed I could not say. If your lordship would wait till Mr Fletcher comes in, maybe he would know.’
‘It looks to me like a damned fishy business,’ said Rupert severely, and followed Léonie into the hall.
He found her grace trying to pump the housekeeper. When she saw him Léonie said: ‘Rupert, it is what I do not at all understand! She says the girl was never here. And I do not think she is lying to me, for she is my servant, and not Dominique’s.’
Lord Rupert divested himself of his heavy Rockelaure. ‘Well, if Vidal’s got rid of the wench already, I’d say it’s quick work,’ he remarked admiringly. ‘Stap me, if I know how he manages it! I always found ’em cling so there was no shaking the dear creatures off at all.’
Léonie cast him a glance of scorn and swept upstairs. The housekeeper would have followed her, but his lordship detained her, and broached the matter nearest his heart. The housekeeper was shocked to learn that the travellers had not yet dined, and hurried away to order a meal to be prepared at once.
When Léonie saw Rupert again dinner was on the table, and his lordship had just come in from a visit to the stables. He took his seat opposite Léonie, and said with a puzzled air: ‘Blister me if I can make head or tail of this coil. Vidal’s damned lackeys are as close as a lot of oysters. Y’know, Léonie, the boy’s a marvel, so he is. I never could keep a servant who didn’t blab all my affairs to the world.’
‘He is coming back,’ Léonie said positively. ‘I have looked in his room, and all his clothes are there.’
Lord Rupert coughed. ‘Anything else, my dear?’ he asked, with delicacy.
‘Nothing,’ said Léonie. ‘It is very curious, do you not think? For where can the girl be?’
‘That’s what beats me,’ confessed Rupert. ‘Not but what I never thought to find her here. But if she’s not, why is Vidal? That’s what I don’t understand. Now, I’ve been talking to the grooms. All I can find is that Vidal left Paris by the Port Royal to-day. Naturally, I don’t like to ask ’em point-blank if he’d a wench with him, and none of ’em –’
‘Why not?’ interrupted the Duchess.
‘Burn it, you can’t ask lackeys questions like that, Léonie!’
‘I do not see why not. I want to know, and if I do not ask who will tell me?’
‘They’ll never tell you, anyway, my dear,’ his lordship informed her.
Dinner was over when Fletcher at last put in an appearance, and Rupert and Léonie had repaired to the library. Fletcher came in, sedate as ever, and begged her grace’s pardon for having been out when she arrived. Léonie brushed that aside, and once more demanded to know her son’s whereabouts.
‘I think, your grace,’ he answered guardedly, ‘that his lordship has gone to Dijon.’
Lord Rupert stared at him. ‘What in the fiend’s name does he want in Dijon?’ he asked.
‘His lordship did not tell me, my lord.’
Léonie smote her hands together. ‘Voyons, I find it insupportable that no one can tell me anything about my son! Speak, you! Was that girl with M. le Marquis? – No, I will not be quiet, Rupert! Was she with him, Fletcher?’
‘I beg your grace’s pardon?’ Mr Fletcher was all polite bewilderment.
‘Do not beg my pardon again, or I shall become enraged!’ Léonie said dangerously. ‘It is no use to tell me you do not know of any girl, for me I am well aware that M. le Marquis had one with him when he left England. That is not a thing extraordinary. It is true, is it not?’
Mr Fletcher cast an appealing glance at Lord Rupert, who said testily: ‘Don’t stare at me, man! We know the girl was with his lordship.’
Mr Fletcher bowed. ‘As your lordship says.’
‘Well, has she gone to Dijon?’
‘I could not say, my lord.’
Léonie eyed him with hostility. ‘Did she leave this house with M. le Marquis?’
‘No, your grace. She was not with his lordship when he set forward on his journey.’
‘There you go, my dear!’ said Rupert. ‘Vidal’s got rid of her, and we may as well go home again before Avon gets wind of the affair.’
Léonie told Mr Fletcher he might go, and when the door had closed behind him, she turned to Rupert with an expression of great anxiety on her face. ‘Rupert, it becomes more and more serious!’
‘Devil a bit!’ said his lordship cheerfully. ‘You can’t get away from it, the girl’s not with Vidal now, so I don’t see we’ve aught to worry over!’
‘But Rupert, you do not understand at all! I have a very big fear that Dominique may have cast her off – in a rage, tu sais.’
Lord Rupert disposed his limbs more comfortably in his chair. ‘I shouldn’t wonder if he had,’ he agreed. ‘It don’t concern us, thank the Lord!’
Léonie got up, and began to move about the room. ‘If he has done that it is a crime one does not forgive. I must find her.’
Lord Rupert blinked. ‘If she ain’t with that precious son of yours what do you want with her now?’ he inquired.
‘Do you think I will permit my son to abandon a girl in Paris?’ Léonie said fiercely. ‘That is noble, yes! I tell you, I have been alone in a great city and there is nothing I do not know of what may happen to a girl who has no protector.’
‘But you said this wench was a –’
‘I may have said it, but that was because I was angry. I do not know what she is, and I will find her immediately. If Dominique has done her a wrong he shall marry her.’
Lord Rupert clasped his head in his hands. ‘Hang me, if I know what you’re about, Léonie!’ he said. ‘Here’s me dragged out of England to help you save the Cub from an adventuress, as I thought, and now you say the boy’s to marry her!’
Léonie paid not the slightest heed to this. She went on pacing the room until suddenly an idea came to her, and she stopped short. ‘Rupert, Juliana is in Paris!’
‘What of it?’ said his lordship.
‘But do you not see, that if Vidal has been staying here of course Juliana has met him?’
‘Do you think she might know why the plaguey boy has gone off to Dijon?’ inquired Rupert hopefully. ‘That’s what bothers me. Why Dijon?’
Léonie wrinkled her brow in a puzzled manner. ‘But why, Rupert, is it Dijon that bothers you? I find the whole of this affair so very strange and without reason that for Dominique to have gone to Dijon is a bagatelle.’
‘Well, I don’t know,’ Rupert said. ‘It’s such a devilish queer place to go to. Dijon! What in the fiend’s name would anybody want there? I’ll tell you what it is, Léonie, the boy’s behaving mighty oddly.’ He shook his head. ‘The ninth earl was given to these turns, so they say. It’s a bad business.’
Léonie stared at him. Lord Rupert tapped his forehead significantly. Léonie said in great indignation: ‘Are you telling me that my son is mad?’
‘We’ll hope he ain’t,’ Rupert said pessimistically, ‘but you can’t deny he’s behaving in a manner no one would call sane. Dijon! Why, it’s absurd!’
‘If you were not Monseigneur’s brother, Rupert, I should have one big quarrel with you. Mad! Voyons, he is not so mad as you, for you have not any sense at all. Let us go to find Juliana.’
They found, not Juliana, but her hostess, laboriously writing what seemed to be a very long letter. When they were ushered into her boudoir she displayed as much startled surprise as could be expected of anyone so habitually placid. She got up to embrace Léonie, almost falling upon her neck. ‘Mon Dieu, is it you, Léonie?’ she said, with a fat gasp. Then she held out a checking hand. ‘Not my cousin Justin? Do not say my cousin Justin is here!’ she implored.
‘Lord, you wouldn’t see me here if he was in Paris!’ said Rupert reassuringly.
‘If Fanny is here, I cannot face her!’ stated madame in palpitating t
ones. She pointed to her desk, and the scattered sheets of gilt paper. ‘I am writing to her now. Why have you come? I am glad, yes, but I do not know why you have come.’
‘Glad, are you? Well, it don’t sound like it,’ commented his lordship. ‘We’ve come chasing after that plaguey nephew of mine, and a devilish silly errand it is.’
Madame sank down on to a spindle-legged chair, and stared at him with her mouth open. ‘You know, then?’ she faltered.
‘Yes, yes, we know everything!’ Léonie said. ‘Now tell me where is Dominique, Elisabeth? Please tell me quickly.’
‘But I do not know!’ cried madame, spreading out her two plump hands.
‘Oh, peste !’ said Léonie impatiently.
‘Come now, that’s the only thing we do know,’ said his lordship. ‘Vidal’s gone to Dijon.’
Madame looked from him to Léonie in blank bewilderment. ‘To Dijon? But why? Gracious God, why to Dijon?’
‘Just what I said myself, cousin,’ replied Rupert triumphantly. ‘I don’t say the boy hasn’t his reasons, but what the devil he can want in Dijon beats me.’
‘Let me see Juliana,’ interrupted the Duchess. ‘I think perhaps she will know where is my son, for he is fond of her, and I feel very certain that she has seen him.’
Madame gave a start. ‘Juliana?’ she echoed hollowly. ‘Alas, then, you do not know!’
Lord Rupert looked at her with misgiving in his face. ‘Burn it, I believe you’re going to start a mystery now. What’s to do? Not that I want to know, for I’ve enough on my hands as it is, but you’d best tell us and so be done with it.’
Thus encouraged, madame delivered her terrific pronouncement: ‘Juliana has eloped with Vidal!’
The effect of this on her hearers was to bereave them, momentarily, of all power of speech. Léonie stood staring in astonished incredulity, and Lord Rupert’s jaw dropped perceptibly. Léonie found her tongue first.
‘Bah, what a piece of nonsense!’ she said. ‘I do not at all believe it!’
‘Read that!’ commanded madame dramatically, and handed her a crumpled sheet of paper.
It contained a brief message in Juliana’s sprawling characters: ‘My dear Tante, pray do not be in a taking, but I have gone with Vidal. I have No Time to write more, for I am in Desperate Haste. Juliana.’
‘But – but it is not possible!’ stammered Léonie, growing quite pale.
Lord Rupert snatched the letter unceremoniously out of her hand. ‘Here, let me read it!’ he said. His eyes ran over the sheet. ‘Damme, if this doesn’t beat all!’ he ejaculated. ‘Oh, there’s not a doubt about it: the boy’s gone stark, staring crazy.’ He struck the paper with his hand. ‘It ain’t decent, Léonie! I’ve naught to say against him abducting this other wench: there’s no harm in that. But when he takes to running off with his cousin, blister it, it’s time he was clapped up!’
Mme. de Charbonne followed this rather imperfectly. ‘I do not understand. Vidal has eloped with Juliana, that is seen. But why, I ask you? Is it not permitted that they wed? Now they make a scandal, and Fanny will come here, and I am afraid of Fanny.’
Léonie, who had possessed herself of Juliana’s letter again, said stubbornly: ‘I do not believe it. Dominique does not love Juliana. There is a mistake. I remember, too, that Juliana is going to marry the Nobody.’
Madame de Charbonne said that she still did not understand. Upon the matter being made plain to her, she remarked thoughtfully: ‘Ah, that is the young Englishman, without doubt. He comes very often to see Juliana.’
‘What, is Frederick Comyn in Paris, too, then?’ demanded Rupert.
‘That is the name,’ nodded madame. ‘A young man tres comme il faut. But Juliana is going to marry Dominique.’
‘No!’ said Léonie firmly. ‘He does not want to, and he shall not.’
‘But, my dear, he has eloped with her, and he must certainly marry her.’
‘Lord, that’s nothing, Elisabeth!’ said Rupert. ‘Juliana ain’t the only girl Vidal’s eloped with. I’ll tell you what it is, the boy’s a Bluebeard.’
‘Stop saying that he has eloped with Juliana!’ ordered Léonie, her eyes flashing. ‘I do not know why he has taken her away, but of a certainty he has a reason.’
‘Taken her to Dijon, too,’ said my lord thoughtfully. ‘Y’know, the more I think on it the less I believe in this Dijon rubbish. It doesn’t make sense. I can swallow the rest, but I’ll admit that worries me.’
‘It is of all things the most incomprehensible,’ agreed madame.
‘But you are imbécile, Rupert! To go to Dijon, that is not a great affair! Many people go to Dijon: it is nothing!’
‘Do they?’ said his lordship sceptically. ‘Well, I never met anyone that did. Why should they? What’s to do at Dijon? Tell me that!’
‘It is a town, Rupert, is it not? Then, of course, people go there. I do not find that part incomprehensible. But that Vidal should run away with Juliana – voyons, that is so incomprehensible that I do not believe it.’ She turned to Madame de Charbonne. ‘Do not write to Fanny! Me, I will arrange everything.’
Madame sighed. ‘Very well, my dear. I do not want to write to Fanny, I am sure. It has been a very perplexing day, very énervant, I assure you. I ask myself, where, too, is the other girl? But that is not my affair, only that I think it very strange to depart without a word to me.’
‘What other girl?’ asked Rupert, puzzled.
‘The girl that was the friend of Juliana. Juliana asked her to visit us. She was in Paris with her aunt, and Juliana invited her to stay in my house.’
Léonie brushed this aside. ‘I am not interested in Juliana’s friend. She is not at all à propos.’
‘No, my dear, but I think it odd that she should go away like that.’
‘Belike she’s gone with Vidal too,’ Lord Rupert said sarcastically.
Léonie refused to be diverted by this artless suggestion. She had been thinking hard, and now said: ‘If the Nobody – what is his name, Rupert? – Comyn. I will remember. If M. Comyn is in Paris, I think Juliana has eloped with him. Naturally, she would not tell you that, Elisabeth. If Vidal is with them, it is, sans doute, to make it to appear quite respectable. They had fled, perhaps to Dijon, and Vidal went to – to – en chaperon, in effect.’
Lord Rupert listened to this in considerable astonishment. ‘Do you tell me Vidal’s gone to play propriety?’ he asked blankly. ‘Vidal? No, rabbit it, that’s too much! You’re the boy’s mother, and of course you’re bound to make the best of him, but to say he’s gone to a silly place like Dijon to be a duenna to Juliana – Lord, you must be besotted, my dear!’
An irrepressible dimple peeped in Léonie’s cheek. ‘It is not perhaps very probable,’ she admitted. ‘But he has not eloped with Juliana. I know he has not! It is all so strange that it makes my head ache, and I see that there is only one thing to do.’
Lord Rupert breathed a sigh of relief. ‘You’re a sensible woman, Léonie, ’pon my soul you are. If the luck favours us we’ll reach home before Avon gets back from Newmarket.’
Léonie tied the strings of her cloak under her chin, and shot a mischievous look at his lordship. ‘Mon pauvre, we are not going home.’
Lord Rupert said disgustedly: ‘I might have known it. If ever there was a female with silly, wild notions in her head –’
‘I am very sensible. You said so,’ Léonie pointed out, twinkling. ‘We will start very early in the morning, Rupert, and go to Dijon.’ She paused, and added buoyantly: ‘Du vrai, I find it fort amusant, you know. For it seems to me that my poor Dominique has now two ladies he must marry à l’instant, which is a thing not permitted. It does not amuse you, Rupert?’
‘Amuse me?’ gasped his lordship. ‘Amuse me to go junketing through France after that young devil and his pack of fem
ales? No, it don’t! Bedlam’s the place for Vidal, and damme, when I think of trying to explain all this to Avon I’ve a strong notion I’ll end there myself.’ With which his lordship seized his hat and cane, and bidding his open-mouthed cousin a curt farewell, flung open the door for Léonie to pass out.
Sixteen
By the time Miss Challoner and Mr Comyn reached Dijon, neither regarded the coming nuptials with anything but feelings of profound depression, although each was determined to be married as soon as was possible. Mr Comyn was prompted by his sense of propriety, and Miss Challoner by her dread of the Marquis’s arrival.
They reached Dijon late in the day, and put up at the best inn. Miss Challoner desired Mr Comyn to wait upon the English divine at once, but he was firm in refusing to go until the morning. He contended that it would be thought a very odd thing were he to demand to see the divine at the dinner-hour, and he informed Miss Challoner that if she supposed him to be afraid of my Lord Vidal, she quite mistook the matter. It was Miss Challoner’s wish to leave Dijon for Italy immediately the wedding was over. Mr Comyn was quite agreeable, but if there were the least chance of the Marquis’s arrival, it would be more consonant with his dignity (he said) to await him in Dijon. He had no desire to escape a meeting with his lordship, and he pointed out to Miss Challoner that since Vidal was known to be deadly with his pistols, a hurried flight to Italy would savour very much of fright.
Miss Challoner, always reasonable, could appreciate the feelings which prompted Mr Comyn to linger in Dijon, but dreaded the issue. She condemned the whole practice of duelling, and Mr Comyn agreed that it was a stupid custom, and one that should be abolished.
On the morning following, he went to wait upon Mr Leonard Hammond, who was staying with his young charge at a château about three miles distant from the town. Miss Challoner, left to her own devices, found herself nervously listening for the sound of wheels, and continually getting up to look out of the window. This would not do, she decided; and since she hardly expected Mr Comyn to return before noon she tied on her hat, and went out for a walk. It may have been the state of mind she was in, but she could find little to interest her, and having looked at three milliners’ shops, and four mantua-makers, she went back to the inn to await Mr Comyn’s return.