Truly Master Legros had no cause not to accept the clerk's offer. However villainous the man's conduct might or might not be, there could be no harm in accepting his escort in broad daylight as far as the house of my lord of Stowmaries.
Legros was a complete stranger in the English city, which he thought overwhelmingly vast and terribly dirty. He had heard many tales of the plague in London, and though this had occurred thirteen years ago, he still thought the place infected and mistrusted the hackney coaches and carrying chairs which were plying the streets for hire.
After hurried consultation with his daughter, he decided that no harm could come of being escorted by the clerk through the streets of London. The latter spoke French and would be vastly useful, and he could easily be dismissed, once my Lord Stowmaries' house had been reached.
Good M. Legros was suffering from an unusually severe attack of chronic fussiness. He could not have sat still another hour, and was for starting immediately for my lord's house. Rose Marie had no reason for wishing to put off that interview, the thought of which she abhorred more and more strongly as the time for its occurrence drew nigh.
She was conscious of a desire to get it over, to put finality between the inevitable and her own ever-rebellious hopes. For her parents' sake she wanted to see Lord Stowmaries grateful and yielding; for her own she almost wished that he remained obdurate. She would gladly have purchased her freedom at the price of more bitter humiliation than she had yet endured, yet she had set herself the task of purchasing the content and happiness of those she cared for at the price of her freedom and the most bitter of all humiliation.
These contradictory thoughts and wishes fretted her and rendered her nervous and agitated. But at her father's bidding, she was ready to make a start.
When Legros once more came down into the courtyard, dressed for the momentous visit, and with his daughter on his arm, the Huguenot clerk was nowhere to be seen. He soon reappeared, however, almost breathless from fast running, but seemingly ready to accompany the distinguished foreign visitors withersoever they wished to go.
He had just had time in the interim to consult with Master Daniel Pye as to what had best be done.