Man and Maid

Then all over me there rushed a mad worship for my little love. Her

splendid unselfishness, her noble self-sacrifice, her dignity, her

serenity. I could have kissed the ground under her feet.

I made Burton spend untold time telephoning to the Embassy, and then to

Versailles to Colonel Harcourt--would he not dine with me? He was sorry

he was engaged but he would lunch the next day. Then when the long

evening was in front of me alone--I could hardly bear it. And, driven to

desperation at last, when Burton was undressing me, I said to him: "Did you ever know anything of the Hartlefords, Burton--Bulteel is the

family name?"

"Can't say as I did personally, Sir Nicholas," he answered, "but of

course, when I was a young boy taking my first fourth-footman's place,

before I came to your father, Sir Guy, at Her Grace of Wiltshire's, I

could not help hearing of the scandal about the cheating at cards. The

whole nobility and gentry was put to about it, and nothing else was

talked of at dinner."

"Try and tell me what you remember of the story."

So Burton held forth in his own way for a quarter of an hour. There had

been no possible doubt of the crime, it was the week after the Derby,

and Bulteel had lost heavily it was said. He was caught red-handed and

got off abroad that night, and the matter would have been hushed up

probably but for the added sensation of Lady Hilda's elopement with him.

That set society by the ears, and the thing was the thrill of the

season. Mr. Marchant had been "all broken-up" by it, and delayed the

divorce so that as far as Burton could remember, Captain Bulteel could

not marry Lady Hilda for more than a year afterwards. All this coincided

with what I already knew. Lord Braxted too, "took on fearful," and died

of a broken heart it was said, leaving every cent to charity. The entail

had been cut in the generation before and the title became extinct at

his death.

I did not tell Burton then of my discovery, and lay long hours in the

dark, thinking and thinking.

What did the Duchesse's attitude mean? In the eyes of the Duchesse de

Courville-Hautevine, neé Adelaide de Mont Orgeuil--to cheat at cards

would be the worst of all the cardinal sins. Such a man as Bobby Bulteel

must be separated from his kind. She knew Lady Hilda probably (the

Duchesse often stayed in England with my mother) and she probably felt a

disapproving pity for the poor lady. The great charity of her mind would

be touched by suffering, if the suffering was apparent, and perhaps she

had some affection for the girl Alathea. But no affection could bridge

the gulf which separated the child of an outcast from her world. The

sins of the father would inevitably be visited upon the children by an

unwritten law, and although she might love Alathea herself, she could

not countenance her union with me. The daughter of a man who had cheated

at cards should go into a convent. I instinctively felt somehow that

this would be her viewpoint.