‘This is very damp for you; shall we not come out into the walk?’ said he.
‘It is very damp,’ said she quickly; ‘but I came because you said you had a message for me: is this true?’
‘Do you think I could deceive you?’ said he, with a sort of tender reproachfulness.
‘It might not be so very easy, if you were to try,’ replied she, laughing.
‘That is not the most gracious way to answer me.’
‘Well, I don’t believe we came here to pay compliments; certainly I did not, and my feet are very wet already--look there, and see the ruin of a _chaussure_ I shall never replace in this dear land of coarse leather and hobnails.’
As she spoke she showed her feet, around which her bronzed shoes hung limp and misshapen.
‘Would that I could be permitted to dry them with my kisses,’ said he, as, stooping, he wiped them with his handkerchief, but so deferentially and so respectfully, as though the homage had been tendered to a princess. Nor did she for a moment hesitate to accept the service.
‘There, that will do,’ said she haughtily. ‘Now for your message.’
‘We are going away, mademoiselle,’ said Atlee, with a melancholy tone.
‘By “we,” mademoiselle, I meant to convey Walpole and myself.’ And now he spoke with the irritation of one who had felt a pull-up.
‘Ah, indeed!’ said she, smiling, and showing her pearly teeth. ‘“We” meant Mr. Walpole and Mr. Atlee.’
‘You should never have guessed it?’ cried he in question.
‘Never--certainly,’ was her cool rejoinder.
‘Well! _He_ was less defiant, or mistrustful, or whatever be the name for it. We were only friends of half-an-hour’s growth when he proposed the journey. He asked me to accompany him as a favour; and he did more, mademoiselle: he confided to me a mission--a very delicate and confidential mission--such an office as one does not usually depute to him of whose fidelity or good faith he has a doubt, not to speak of certain smaller qualities, such as tact and good taste.’
‘Of whose possession Mr. Atlee is now asserting himself?’ said she quietly.
He grew crimson at a sarcasm whose impassiveness made it all the more cutting.
‘My mission was in this wise, mademoiselle,’ said he, with a forced calm in his manner. ‘I was to learn from Mademoiselle Kostalergi if she should desire to communicate with Mr. Walpole touching certain family interests in which his counsels might be of use; and in this event, I was to place at her disposal an address by which her letters should reach him.’