In the outer room, Winterset, unable to find Lady Mary, and supposing her to have joined Lady Rellerton, disposed of his negus, then approached the two visitors to pay his respects to the young prince, whom he discovered to be a stripling of seventeen, arrogant looking, but pretty as a girl. Standing beside the Marquis de Mirepoix - a man of quiet bearing - he was surrounded by a group of the great, among whom Mr. Nash naturally counted himself. The Beau was felicitating himself that the foreigners had not arrived a week earlier, in which case he and Bath would have been detected in a piece of gross ignorance concerning the French nobility - ****** much of de Mirepoix's ex-barber.
"'Tis a lucky thing that fellow was got out of the way," he ejaculated, under cover.
"Thank me for it," rejoined Winterset.
An attendant begged Mr. Nash's notice. The head bailiff sent word that Beaucaire had long since entered the building by a side door.
It was supposed Mr. Nash had known of it, and the Frenchman was not arrested, as Mr. Molyneux was in his company, and said he would be answerable for him. Consternation was so plain on the Beau's trained face that the Duke leaned toward him anxiously.
"The villain's in, and Molyneux hath gone mad!"Mr. Bantison, who had been fiercely elbowing his way toward them, joined heads with them. "You may well say he is in," he exclaimed "and if you want to know where, why, in yonder card-room. I saw him through the half-open door.""What's to be done?" asked the Beau.
"Send the bailiffs - "
"Fie, fie! A file of bailiffs? The scandal!""Then listen to me," said the Duke. "I'll select half-a-dozen gentlemen, explain the matter, and we'll put him in the center of us and take him out to the bailiffs. 'Twill appear nothing. Do you remain here and keep the attention of Beaujolais and de Mirepoix. Come, Bantison, fetch Townbrake and Harry Rakell yonder;I'll bring the others."
Three minutes later, his Grace of Winterset flung wide the card-room door, and, after his friends had entered, closed it.
"Ah!" remarked M. Beaucaire quietly. "Six more large men.
The Duke, seeing Lady Mary, started; but the angry signs of her interview had not left her face, and reassured him. He offered his hand to conduct her to the door. "May I have the honor?""If this is to be known, 'twill be better if I leave after; Ishould be observed if I went now."
"As you will, madam," he answered, not displeased. "And now, you impudent villain," he began, turning to M. Beaucaire, but to fall back astounded. "'Od's blood, the dog hath murdered and robbed some royal prince!" He forgot Lady Mary's presence in his excitement.
"Lay hands on him!" he shouted. "Tear those orders from him!"Molyneux threw himself between. "One word!" he cried. "One word before you offer an outrage you will repent all your lives!""Or let M. de Winterset come alone," laughed M. Beaucaire.
"Do you expect me to fight a cut-throat barber, and with bare hands?""I think one does not expec' monsieur to fight anybody. Would Ifight you, you think? That was why I had my servants, that evening we play. I would gladly fight almos' any one in the won'; but I did not wish to soil my hand with a - ""Stuff his lying mouth with his orders!" shouted the Duke.
But Molyneux still held the gentiemen back. "One moment," he cried.
"M. de Winterset," said Beaucaire, "of what are you afraid? You calculate well. Beaucaire might have been belief - an impostor that you yourself expose'? Never! But I was not goin' reveal that secret. You have not absolve me of my promise.""Tell what you like," answered the Duke. "Tell all the wild lies you have time for. You have five minutes to make up your mind to go quietly.""Now you absolve me, then? Ha, ha! Oh, yes! Mademoiselle," he bowed to Lady Mary, "I have the honor to reques' you leave the room. You shall miss no details if these frien's of yours kill me, on the honor of a French gentleman.""A French what?" laughed Bantison.
"Do you dare keep up the pretense?" cried Lord Town brake. "Know, you villain barber, that your master, the Marquis de Mirepoix, is in the next room."Molyneux heaved a great sigh of relief. "Shall I - " He turned to M. Beaucaire.
The young man laughed, and said: "Tell him come here at once.
"Impudent to the last!" cried Bantison, as Molyneux hurried from the room.
"Now you goin' to see M. Beaucaire's master," said Beaucaire to Lady Mary. "'Tis true what I say, the other night. I cross from Prance in his suite; my passport say as his barber. Then to pass the ennui of exile, I come to Bath and play for what one will. It kill the time. But when the people hear I have been a servant they come only secretly; and there is one of them - he has absolve' me of a promise not to speak - of him I learn something he cannot wish to be tol'.
I make some trouble to learn this thing. Why I should do this?
Well - that is my own rizzon. So I make this man help me in a masque, the unmasking it was, for, as there is no one to know me, I throw off my black wig and become myself - and so I am 'Chateaurien,' Castle Nowhere. Then this man I use', this Winterset, he - ""I have great need to deny these accusations?" said the Duke.
"Nay," said Lady Mary weari1y.
"Shall I tell you why I mus' be 'Victor' and 'Beaucaire' and 'Chateaurien,' and not myself?""To escape from the bailiffs for debts for razors and soap," gibed Lord Townbrake.
"No, monsieur. In France I have got a cousin who is a man with a very bad temper at some time', and he will never enjoy his relatives to do what he does not wish - "He was interrupted by a loud commotion from without. The door was flung open, and the young Count of Beaujolais bounded in and threw his arms about the neck of M. Beaucaire.
"Philippe!" he cried. "My brother, I have come to take you back with me."M. de Mirepoix followed him, bowing as a courtier, in deference;but M. Beaucaire took both his hands heartily. Molyneux came after, with Mr. Nash, and closed the door.
