. . . I hope you don't mind?"
"No, no, not at all--hem! I hope Lady Blakeney is well," said
Chauvelin, hurriedly changing the topic of conversation.
Blakeney, with much deliberation, finished his plate of soup,
drank his glass of wine, and, momentarily, it seemed to Marguerite as
if he glanced all round the room.
"Quite well, thank you," he said at last, drily. There was a
pause, during which Marguerite could watch these two antagonists who,
evidently in their minds, were measuring themselves against one
another. She could see Percy almost full face where he sat at the
table not ten yards from where she herself was crouching, puzzled, not
knowing what to do, or what she should think. She had quite
controlled her impulse now of rushing down hand disclosing herself to
her husband. A man capable of acting a part, in the way he was doing
at the present moment, did not need a woman's word to warn him to be
cautious.
Marguerite indulged in the luxury, dear to every tender
woman's heart, of looking at the man she loved. She looked through
the tattered curtain, across at the handsome face of her husband, in
whose lazy blue eyes, and behind whose inane smile, she could now so
plainly see the strength, energy, and resourcefulness which had caused
the Scarlet Pimpernel to be reverenced and trusted by his followers.
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