"But yes--one of the little black and white ones with the tail of him cut off."
"Oh, a fox-_terrier_." Haidee turned away impatiently, but curiosity obliged her to turn back instantly to hear the rest of the amazing tale.
"At one end of this big nursery studio two white beds, one for the _petit_ Bran and one for the American governess who is permanently installed and very devoted."
"A governess to sleep with Bran!" exclaimed Haidee. "Oh, no, that is too strong. I have never known Val let Bran sleep out of her sight!"
"But yes--it is all so _bizarre_. You must go home and see, my Haidee."
Indeed Haidee registered a resolution to write to Val that very night and ask for a _sortie_ letter to be sent for her to come home for the following Saturday night and Sunday. She was still hating Val with a fierce hatred and had no desire to see her. But this was a thing that had got to be looked into.
"And," continued Madame de Vervanne, with her amiable air of finding everything extremely amusing, "who do I find installed in the studio of Madame Valdana taking tea, indeed making tea, as much at home as if he had collected the sticks for it on the Mascaret beach, but--who do you think, my Cabbage?"
"Goodness knows!" muttered the Cabbage. "Val is mad."
"Why, who but our _cher_ Poulot, Rupert!"
"Rupert! She 's got _him_, now?" cried Haidee, and her face darkened as definitely as if some one had passed a blacking-brush over it.
"Yes," said the Comtesse softly, reflectively. "It is as you say. First poor dear Sacha, now the innocent Poulot. Who next?" She sighed.
There was a little silence. Then Haidee said:
"Rupert has been twice to see me, once on Sunday and once on Thursday."
"Ah! and did he tell you how many times he went to see Madame Valentine?"
"No, indeed, and I don't care anyhow," was the retort given with perhaps unnecessary fierceness.
"But," cooed Madame soothingly, "one should care a little, _chère_ Haidee, for the sake of the poor good Poulot. She is no doubt a very fine lady, the charming Mistress Valentine, but we do not wish to see Rupert suffer as Sacha did."
The subtle words bit into Haidee's heart like acid on an old wound. She had been very much touched at the Comtesse's act in writing to the Directrice for permission to call at the Lycée. And it was very gratifying that Madame de Vervanne should have arrived in a motor which also contained a young lieutenant of Dragons in uniform, and which stood growling and puffing at the Lycée gates, filling all the girls with excitement and envy. Haidee's vanity too was greatly flattered by the tender and confidential manner of the older woman, who never forgot also to tell her how pretty and clever she was and to give recognition to the fact that she was now seventeen. So different to Val's manner of treating her as though she were still a child and quite unable to arrange her own destiny. A curious, fresh access of fury was aroused in Haidee's breast by the Comtesse's tale of Rupert's devotion to Val. Rupert had been to see Haidee twice. He was stationed at Fontainebleau, doing his second year of military service, and when he came to the Lycée accompanied by his sister Celine he was wearing the ordinary private soldier's uniform, and looking very handsome in the gay red and blue. All the girls had admired him immensely, and Haidee herself liked him extraordinarily better than in Mascaret. While Celine talked with some of the girls she knew, Rupert and Haidee had wandered about the gardens, talking about Sacha and little incidents of their happy time together that now, looked at from a little distance of time, seemed wonderfully perfumed and beautified. The remembrance of these two walks with him made Haidee burn with sudden indignation against Val.