"Why not?" Thérèse enquired in surprise. "Why, you might be my father."
Etienne Rambert winced at the word.
"Ah!" he said, "you must not forget, Thérèse, that I am not your father, but — his: the father of him who —— " but Thérèse's soft hand laid upon his lips prevented him from finishing what he would have said.
To change the conversation Thérèse feigned concern about her own future.
"When we left Querelles," she said, "President Bonnet told me that you would tell me something about my affairs. I gather that my fortune is not a very brilliant one."
It was indeed the fact that after the murder of the Marquise the unpleasant discovery had been made that her fortune was by no means so considerable as had generally been supposed. The estate was mortgaged, and President Bonnet and Etienne Rambert had had long and anxious debates as to whether it might not be well for Thérèse to renounce her inheritance to Beaulieu, so doubtful did it seem whether the assets would exceed the liabilities.
Etienne Rambert made a vague, but significant gesture when he heard the girl raise the point now, but Thérèse had all the carelessness of youth.
"Oh, I shall not be down-hearted," she exclaimed. "My poor grannie always gave me an example of energy and hard work; I've got plenty of pluck, and I will work too. Suppose I turn governess?"
M. Rambert looked at her thoughtfully.
"My dear child, I know how brave and earnest you are, and that gives me confidence. I have thought about your future a great deal already. Some day, of course, some nice and wealthy young fellow will come along and marry you —— Oh, yes, he will: you'll see. But in the meantime it will be necessary for you to have some occupation. I am wondering whether it will not be necessary to let, or even to sell Beaulieu. And, on the other hand, you can't always stay with the Baronne de Vibray."
"No, I realise that," said Thérèse, who, with the native tact that was one of her best qualities, had quickly seen that it would not be long before she would become a difficulty in the way of the independence of the kind Baronne. "That is what troubles me most."
"Your birth and your upbringing have been such that you would certainly suffer much in taking up the difficult and delicate, and sometimes painful, position of governess in a family; and, without wishing to be offensive, I must remind you that you need to have studied very hard to be a governess nowadays, and I am not aware that you are exactly a blue-stocking. But I have an idea, and this is it: for a great many years now I have been on the very friendliest terms with a lady who belongs to the very best English society: Lady Beltham; you may perhaps have heard me speak of her." Thérèse opened wide eyes of astonishment, and Rambert went on: "A few months ago Lady Beltham lost her husband in strange circumstances, and since then she has been good enough to give me more of her confidence than previously. She is immensely rich, and very charitable, and I have frequently been asked by her to look after some of her many financial interests. Now I have often noticed that she has with her several young English ladies who live with her, not as companions, but, shall I say, secretaries? Do you understand the difference? She treats them like friends or relatives, and they all belong to the very best social class, some of them indeed being daughters of English peers. If Lady Beltham, to whom I could speak about it, would admit you into her little company, I am sure you would be in a most delightful milieu, and Lady Beltham, whom, I know, you would please, would almost certainly interest herself in your future. She knows what unhappiness is as well as you do, my dear," he added, bending fondly over the girl, "and she would understand you."
"Dear M. Rambert!" murmured Thérèse, much moved: "do that; speak to Lady Beltham about me; I should be so glad!"
Thérèse did not finish all she would have said. A loud ring at the front door bell broke in upon her words, and Etienne Rambert rose and walked across the room.
"That must be the good Baronne de Vibray come for you," he said.
XIV
Mademoiselle Jeanne
After she had so roughly disposed of the enterprising Henri Verbier, whose most unseemly advances had so greatly scandalised her, Mlle. Jeanne took to her heels, directly she was out of sight of the Royal Palace Hotel, and ran like one possessed. She stood for a moment in the brilliantly lighted, traffic-crowded Avenue Wagram, shaking with excitement and with palpitating heart, and then mechanically hailed a passing cab and told the driver to take her towards the Bois. There she gave another heedless order to go to the boulevard Saint-Denis, but as the cab approached the place de l'Etoile she realised that she was once more near the Royal Palace Hotel, and stopping the driver by the tram lines she dismissed him and got into a tram that was going to the station of Auteuil. It was just half-past eleven when she reached the station.
"When is the next train for Saint-Lazaire?" she asked.
She learned that one was starting almost at once, and hurriedly taking a second-class ticket she jumped into a ladies' carriage and went as far as Courcelles. There she alighted, went out of the station, looked around her for a minute or two to get her bearings, and then walked slowly towards the rue Eugène-Flachat. She hesitated a second, and then walked firmly towards a particular house, and rang the bell.
"A lady to see you, sir," the footman said to M. Rambert.
"Bring her in here at once," said M. Rambert, supposing that the man had kept the Baronne de Vibray waiting in the anteroom.
The drawing-room door was opened a little way, and someone came in and stepped quickly into the shadow by the door. Thérèse, who had risen to hurry towards the visitor, stopped short when she perceived that it was a stranger and not her guardian. Noticing her action, M. Etienne Rambert turned and looked at the person who had entered.
It was a lady.
"To what am I indebted —— " he began with a bow; and then, having approached the visitor, he broke off short. "Good heavens —— !"
The bell rang a second time, and on this occasion the Baronne de Vibray hurried into the room, a radiant incarnation of gaiety.
"I am most dreadfully late!" she exclaimed, and was hurrying towards M. Etienne Rambert with outstretched hands, full of some amusing story she had to tell him, when she too caught sight of the strange lady standing stiffly in the corner of the room, with downcast eyes.
Etienne Rambert repressed his first emotion, smiled to the Baronne, and then went towards the mysterious lady.
"Madame," he said, not a muscle of his face moving, "may I trouble you to come into my study?"
"Who is that lady, M. Rambert?" said Thérèse when presently M. Rambert came back into the drawing-room. "And how white you are!"
M. Rambert forced a smile.
"I am rather tired, dear. I have had a great deal to do these last few days."
The Baronne de Vibray was full of instant apologies.
"It is all my fault," she exclaimed. "I am dreadfully sorry to have kept you up so late," and in a few minutes more the Baronne's car was speeding towards the rue Boissy-d'Anglais.
M. Rambert hurried back to his study, shut and locked the door behind him, and almost sprang towards the unknown lady, his fists clenched, his eyes starting out of his head.
"Charles!" he exclaimed.
"Papa!" the girl replied, and sank upon a sofa.
There was silence. Etienne Rambert seemed utterly dumbfounded.
"I won't, I won't remain disguised as a woman any longer.