“By no means,” was the emphatic reply. “The woman who has just left is the wife of the man who committed the burglary here. I permitted her to see the revolver which was found. I may have done wrong, but it is my own responsibility. My husband and Sir Richard will naturally know of it. Both will be told the moment they return. My information to you is for yourself and not for the servants’ hall.”
Parkins bowed low. Every day his respect for his new mistress increased.
“I’ll fetch another box at once, my lady,” he said.
CHAPTER XXIII
The western half of the county dined that night at Glenlitten, and Félice had never played the part of hostess with more charm or dignity. The French Ambassador, who was a guest in the district, sat on her right, and it was an obvious joy to her to converse in her own language. The Marquis de Bressac was a man of great distinction, a well-known diplomat, and famous traveller.
“I would like to tell you, Lady Glenlitten,” he said, “that I am one of those who deeply and fervently sympathise with your country people.”
A light flashed into her face, only to pass away again almost immediately.
“In my younger days,” the Marquis went on, “I was just an attaché to our Embassy in St. Petersburg and I made many delightful friends. Without a doubt I must have known some of your relations.” Félice’s lips were trembling.
“I am not very happy when I force myself to talk of them,” she confessed.
“I offer you a thousand apologies,” the Ambassador said earnestly. “I should have known better than to have alluded to a subject so painful.”
Félice shivered a little. She was looking into that horrible room in Milden Square. De Bressac leaned over and repeated his polite but sincere regrets. He fancied her gazing across Europe at less sordid but even more terrible things.
“I am very foolish to have talked to you like this of a past that can hold nothing hut tragedy,” he regretted. “I would rather you told me of your life here in England. It appeals to you, the sport, the out-door existence? Never did I see a man who looked so well and happy as your husband.”
She pulled herself together. She was a great lady and she was hostess to this very brilliant party.
“My husband deserves to look well and happy,” she said. “He is the kindest man I know. And as for the life here, who would not love it? I am even falling in love with the climate.”
“Mon Dieu!” the Marquis murmured, under his breath.
“It is cold sometimes, it is grey, it is damp,” she admitted, “but you face it all. Oh, how hard it was to get me to do that at first. Still, you face it all, and presently there is a glow and one feels well. And the greyness has its beauty and the cold sends the blood springing through your veins. I have only lived here a few months, but I think I could never like to live in any other country.”
“You are very fortunately placed,” he remarked. “Your estates are wonderful. For at least seven miles of our motor ride here we were in your park, I believe, and some of the views are delightful. Then I have seen your house in Scotland too, in the distance. That is marvellously picturesque.”
“Sometimes I love it,” she agreed. “The castle is almost on the edge of the cliff and the seas below are splendid, but I like this better. You will shoot tomorrow, Marquis?”
“We are all coming over,” he answered. “Your husband has just been saying that he will have eleven guns. That seems to be a great many for you, but in France it is nothing. They tell us we need to ask large parties to secure a bag there. We shoot so much worse than the English. Your husband, with only six guns, did wonderfully to-day.”
The conversation drifted along the usual channels. At the lower end of the table, Lady Susan was trying to get Haslam to talk once more of West Africa, but without success.
“Last night, Lady Susan,” he confessed, “I forgot myself for a little time. I try never to speak of the things I do not fully understand. They only confuse other people and confuse me.”
“But they told me,” she persisted, “that you made an amazing statement.”
“Did I? One talks a great deal too much sometimes after your brother’s famous port.”
“They told me that you know the real secret of that terrible night here,” she added, lowering her voice. “Mr. Grindells insisted that you actually said so.”
Haslam sipped his wine thoughtfully.
“There are many stages and degrees of knowledge, Lady Susan,” he reminded her. “One may have been convinced by actual proof, and if that is so, one may share one’s knowledge with every one, because one can justify one’s statement. And again, one may know by conviction just as absolutely, but without the pillars of evidence below, and when it is by conviction one knows one had better hold one’s peace. … I never saw our hostess look so brilliant as to-night.”
“I think that Félice is almost the sweetest and the most beautiful thing alive,” Lady Susan declared with enthusiasm. “Even the great sadness of her history has not left a single chastening mark upon her. Hers is the happiness which no one ever grudges. It is the happiness that feeds on happiness and gives out happiness—the real joy of living. When I heard that my brother was marrying some one he had found in a little village of France, I must confess that I was afraid. Now I am very happy.”
“It is a very fortunate thing for her,” Haslam said, “that you all are so fond of her. It helps her to miss less her own relatives.”
“She lost all of them, did she not?” Lady Susan asked.
“Every one, I understand,” Haslam replied. “They were extreme Imperialists, and never had a chance. Even now, she cannot bear to think of them… .”
Lady Susan lowered her voice a little. There had been a sort of unspoken agreement not to discuss last month’s tragedy in public.
“You were there when they found the weapon this afternoon?” she asked.
“Close at hand,” he answered. “I have seen it since.”
“I suppose that destroys all Sir Richard’s theories of his client’s innocence?” she ventured.
“I should imagine,” Haslam told her diffidently, “that it is an important piece of evidence.”
Lady Susan accepted the hint and at the same time caught her hostess’ eye.
“There is Félice looking round for Lady Manfield,” she remarked, rising to her feet. “Don’t sit here drinking port all the evening, Mr. Haslam. I want a rubber or two of bridge and I know it’s going to be an early night because of the shooting tomorrow.”
“I’ll do my best,” he promised… .
“Tell us some more West African experiences, Haslam,” Grindells called down to him from the other end of the table.
Haslam shook his head.
“I talked too much last night,” he said. “I expect you’re all thinking me pretty crazy. Still, if you live in that atmosphere, you can’t help imbibing a little of it.”
“Very good for one too,” Manfield declared. “We’re too cut-and-dried a generation. The whole human race is becoming too much made to pattern. We accept whatever happens too philosophically. We haven’t enough superstition left even to be religious. We prefer to be automatic.”
“Perhaps,” Glenlitten observed, “it’s