Meanwhile the trio Grey had left to their own devices, with scarcely a word of explanation, were getting into a wellnigh inextricable tangle.
“Fancy my deciding to run off this way on the spur of the moment, without even a handful of luggage,” Miss Van Tuyl had exclaimed, “but Mr. Grey and I have so much to talk about I just couldn’t think of waiting another twenty-four hours, and he said he couldn’t possibly stop over another day in Paris.”
Minna had recognised her minutes before on the platform, as the beautiful lady she had noticed the previous afternoon at Versailles, and she had been and was still wondering how it came about that her Uncle Max had not seen her and spoken to her there. And now this mention of a Mr. Grey perplexed her. Was he in another car or another compartment? And if she had so much to say to him why had she stood talking to another man until the train was on the point of leaving? and why was she sitting here now instead of being with him?
“American women are such fun,” O’Hara was saying, his cheery, ruddy face one broad smile. “I admire them awfully. They’re so superbly self-reliant.”
“You’re an American, Miss Van Tuyl?” the Fräulein ventured. “Oh, of course. It was in America, I suppose, you met Uncle Max?”
“Uncle Max?” she questioned. “I don’t understand you. Who is----”
“Didn’t you know he was my uncle?” the girl asked, a little embarrassed.
“Really, I--” she began again. And then O’Hara came to the rescue:
“Our mutual friend, Miss Van Tuyl. After all, what’s in a name? Miss von Altdorf calls him ‘Uncle Max’ and you--what is your favourite pet name for him? Or is it rude of me to ask?”
“Oh, I beg your pardon,” Hope implored, addressing the fair-haired girl beside her; “how stupid of me! Yes, of course; I met him in America when we were both very young. You were with him yesterday at Versailles, weren’t you? I remember you distinctly. Mr. Grey wrote me something very nice about you.”
“About me? Mr. Grey?” It was the Fräulein’s turn to be audibly perplexed.
“Yes, certainly, Mr. Grey wrote me about you.”
O’Hara laughed aloud. Should he or should he not, he asked himself, set them right and thus end this game of cross-purposes? It was very amusing, it appealed to his native love of fun and he enjoyed it, so he concluded to let the play go on.