Devil’s Cub

“I see, ma’am, you have not heard the whole. Let me explain to you that it was not Mary his lordship wanted, but my little Sophia here. He has been for ever upon my doorstep, and I fear, ma’am, he has quite turned the child’s head. I blush to confess it to your grace, but he attempted to seduce Sophia, of course unbeknownst to me. I do not know what lies he told her, but he had it all arranged to fly with her. I have reared her very strict, ma’am, and how should she dream he did not mean marriage? She thought he would take her to Gretna Green. Oh, I’ll not deny it was mighty foolish and wrong of her, but girls will have these romantic fancies, your grace, and heaven knows what persuasions his lordship may have used. No, Sophy, be quiet!”

Leonie looked at the indignant Sophia, and smiled. “You present to me my son in a new r61e,” she said. “I have never known him to take so much trouble. It seems he was in love with you quite en desespere.”

“He did love me!” Sophia said chokingly. “He never looked at Mary! Never!”

“Hold your tongue, Sophy! Not but what it is true, ma’am. His lordship was mad for the child. But Mary took it’ into her head ’twas not marriage he intended, and what she did was to save her sister from ruin.”

“It is of a nobility almost incredible, madame. What did this Mary do?”

Mrs. Challoner threw out her hands dramatically. “She took Sophia’s place, ma’am. It was night, and she was masked, for Sophia has found an old loo-mask gone from her drawer. What she had in mind to do I know not, but she meant to return, your grace. And all this was five days ago, and there is no sign of my poor girl. His lordship has run off with her to France.”

“Indeed?” Leonie said. “You have good information, madame. Who told you that M. le Marquis has gone to France? It is not known to many.”

Mrs. Challoner cast a startled glance at Sophia. “I told mamma,” Sophia said sullenly.

“You interest me—oh, but very much, mademoiselle! You thought, en effet, that he would go to Scotland, and he told you that he would go to France.”

“I see that your grace has guessed it!” Mrs. Challoner said desperately. “Sophia, leave the room. I have something of a private nature to say to her grace.”

“I won’t leave the room,” Sophia answered rebelliously. “You mean to make Vidal wed Mary, and it is not fair! He loves me, me, me! Mary stole him, the mean cat, but she shan’t have him!”

“Ah, I perceive the truth!” said Leonie. “It is Miss Mary Challoner who has abducted my son. I make her my compliments.”

“It is no such thing!” broke in Mrs. Challoner. “Alas, it is true that Sophia here would have gone with my lord to France, and dreadful it is to me to have to own to it. But girls will be for ever reading romances, ma’am, as I make no doubt your grace knows. Yes, Sophia was swept off her feet by his lordship’s wiles, but Mary stepped in with some scheme of her own to send my lord packing. She has saved her poor sister at the price of her own honour, ma’am!”

Leonie said thoughtfully: “It is strange, I find, that this so noble sister did not rattier inform you, madame, of what mademoiselle here meant to do. You, who have reared your daughters with such strictness, could have arranged matters more easily, is it not so?”

“Indeed, and I do not know why Mary did not tell me, ma’am, but she is an odd secret girl, and will for ever be thinking she knows better than her mamma.”

Leonie rose. She was smiling, but her dark eyes were bright with anger. “You do not know? Then me, I will tell you. It is plain to me that mademoiselle Mary has thought that she will become Madame la Marquise, and not her sister. As to that, we shall see. You have said to my sister that you will make one big scandal. Vous pouvez vous eviter de la peine, madame; it is I who will make the scandal. I do not desire that my son should have a liaison with your daughter, for she appears to me to be a young woman not at all comme il faut. I shall go to Paris at once, and I shall bring this clever Mary back to you in good time. And if you are so stupid that you cry aloud that the Marquis my son has carried off your daughter you will look even more foolish than you do now, for it will be seen that I am with M. le Marquis, and I think if I say I was with him all the time people will perhaps believe my word before that of Madame Challoner. Que pensez-vous, madame?”

Mrs. Challoner came to her feet in a hurry, and said loudly: “Ho, ma’am, and is that how it is to be? And do you think my poor deceived girl will have nothing to say to that fine tale? She shall declare her wrongs to the world, for I’ll make her, and I’ll see she is heard!”

Leonie gave a light, scornful laugh. “Vraiment? It is a story so silly, madame, that I think people will say ‘quel tas de betises!’ and not at all believe you. And me I shall say only that this Mary forced herself upon my son, and I shall be believed, madame, do not doubt.” She swept a curtsy, ignored Sophia, who was gaping at her in astonishment, and walked out of the room before Mrs. Challoner could collect her scattered wits.

Sophia bounced out of her chair, crying: “There, mamma! That’s all your scheming has led to! Lord, I vow I could die of laughing at you!”

Mrs. Challoner promptly boxed her ears. Sophia began at once to cry, but her mother had gone to the window, and was watching a liveried footman hand her grace into the carriage. She said through her teeth: “I’m not finished yet, Sophy, don’t think it. We’ll see who has the laugh, your grace!” She turned quickly. “I’m going to make a journey,” she said. “You’ll be off to your Uncle Henry’s house, Sophy, till I come back, and see you behave yourself circumspectly!”

In the white house in Curzon Street Lady Fanny was eagerly awaiting Leonie’s return. When her grace came into the boudoir she fairly pounced upon her, a dozen questions tripping off her tongue. Leonie untied the strings of her becoming hat, and threw it on the table. “Bah, quelle viellle guenon!” she said. “I have frightened her a little, and I tell you this, Fanny, I will not have Dominique ally himself with the daughter of such a one. I go at once to France to arrange the matter.”

Lady Fanny regarded her shrewdly. “La, my dear, you’re in such a heat you’d best wait till you’ve cooled a little.”

“I am not in a heat at all,” Leonie said with great precision. “I am of a coolness quite remarkable, and I would like to kill that woman.”

“You’re in a rage, my love, don’t tell me! You’ve forgotten your English, which is a very sure sign, though I can’t conceive why you should become so vastly French as soon as you lose your temper.”

Leonie stalked to the mantelpiece, picked up a vase from it, and quite deliberately smashed it. Lady Fanny shrieked, and cried out: “My precious Sevres vase!”

Leonie looked down, conscience-stricken, at the pieces of porcelain lying on the floor. “I do not behave like a lady,” she said. “I did not know it was Sevres. It was very ugly.”

Fanny giggled. “Hideous, love! I’ve always hated it. But, ’pon rep, I thought you had learned to curb that dreadful temper of yours! I vow you’re as great a hoyden as ever you were twenty years ago. What did that odious creature say to make you so angry?”

Leonie said fiercely: “It is a trick, all of it, to make Dominique many that girl. She thought she could make me afraid, but it is I who will make her afraid! Dominique shall not marry that—that— salope!”

“Leonie!” gasped Fanny, clapping her hands over her ears. “How dare you?”

“She is!” raged her grace. “And that mother, she is nothing but an entremetteuse! Me, I know very well her type! And she will be my Dominique’s belle-mere, hein? No, and no, and no!”

Lady Fanny uncovered her ears. “Lord, my dear, don’t put yourself about! Vidal won’t want to marry the wench. But what of the scandal?”

“Je m’en fiche!” said Leonie crudely. “And pray will Justin agree with you? My dearest love, there’s been too much scandal attached to Vidal already, and you know it. Ill wager my diamond necklet that woman meant her vulgar threats. She’ll create a stir, I know she will, and ’twill be monstrous disagreeable for all of us. I declare, it’s too bad of Vidal! Why, if there’s a word of truth in what that creature says —which, to be sure, I doubt, for I never heard such a rigmarole in my life—he did not even want the girl! And if you can think of anything in the world he did it for save to plague us I beg you will tell me!”

“John says, for revenge,” Leonie answered, looking troubled. “I have a very big fear he may be right.”

Lady Fanny’s china-blue eyes widened. “Good God, my dear, surely even Vidal would not be such a