The Old Blood Part 47

"Yes. I often wanted to----" Her frown had gone. Her head rose as she drew a deep breath and smiled as she would at herself in the mirror. His pencil hesitated, then went on. "----but thought that you might think I was rude. You don't think so, now?"

"No. You did it beautifully, wonderfully," she replied. "It was the next best thing to knowing that you could really see me. And soon you shall."

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

SPINNING WEBS

War, which shakes human beings of all sorts and conditions together as dice in a box, had placed Peter Smithers and Madame Ribot side by side flying over a main highway of France in the automobile which, with his gift for managing things, he had at his disposal. Her own gift for managing things had secured a vehicle of transit from Paris on a visit to Henriette all to her taste, with companionship all to her purpose.

She was gowned with the simplicity which the war mode required, but most effectively. During the last week her mirror signs had been most favourable, while return to action after many years of retirement had quickened her wits and brightened her smile. Thanks to the way that she had kept her hand in with General Rousseau, Count de la Grange and others, the technique of her art had not deteriorated and she was practising on Peter with a finesse of adaptability to the subject of Henriette's tailor. It was an axiom of the circle in which she had been trained that no one was more susceptible to old world charm of her kind than self-made American millionaires.

"A good-looking woman," thought Peter, "and lots of style."

He was delighted to be better acquainted with her, as he must become in that five hours' ride. The car was a limousine, the cushions soft, the autumn day fair, and Madame Ribot was spinning webs as the rubber tires spun over the road.

"America must be wonderful," she said.

"It's a growing country," Peter replied. "Always growing out of its clothes and too many political tailors down in Washington changing the styles. But it's my country, all right, and we haven't got any Kaisers with their war bonnets on romping around over there."

"And such bold, creative, organising men"--she liked the adjectives and gave them a purring sound--"as you have made America."

"Well, America was there first, but we've certainly stuck a few skysc.r.a.pers about on the redskins' hunting preserves."

She smiled as Peter glanced around and the nature of his smile in return was the authority for a confidential tap-tap of the sole of her shoe on the ha.s.sock under her foot. Convenient ha.s.sock! Powerful, speedy car! Three millions!

"In England, where they recognise men of worth, they would have made you a peer," she remarked, with a sigh. She was putting it on thick, but was convinced that Peter liked it that way. For that matter, Count de la Grange liked it thick, too; and men were much alike.

"Do you think so?" he asked thoughtfully.

"I am certain of it."

"And then they would call me 'My Lord'?" he continued after a pause, almost coyly.

"Yes."

Peter smiled again to himself and at the back of the chauffeur's head.

"Such leaders as you in America do not make their money for sordid purposes. It means power," she went on.

"Perhaps," replied Peter, who remained thoughtful. "You have a way of putting things, Madame Ribot," he added, with another smile.

"You build in the joy of building; and with you, I should think that it was the joy of giving, too. It was easy to see when he was at Mervaux how devoted Phil was to you. He was always speaking of you."

"Was he?" Peter inquired eagerly. "Was he?" he repeated, with a touch of surprise in his tone.

"But it was admiration for you as a man, while it was clear that he meant to make his own way. How fond I became of him! How chivalrous he was to Henriette! How brave he had been! And now they say he will quite recover. I hope so, for his sake."

"He will!" replied Peter.

Tap-tap on the ha.s.sock! Soft, inaudible tap-tap!

"It's like some fairy tale, his story, isn't it?" she murmured; "his and yours. I can understand your happiness in seeing him make good, as you say in America, where you are giving the st.u.r.dy English language something of French piquancy, and your happiness in having him for your heir. It was as if you had found a son."

"He has not been told yet," Peter said quickly. The shoe pressed down nervously on the ha.s.sock in the interval before Peter, as he looked around at her again, added, almost sharply: "I am going to tell him myself when the time comes."

"And without his expecting it--that all is going to him?" she asked, quite casually.

"Yes. I've given my word," Peter replied. "All to be his to do with as he pleases when I'm gone--all except,--you see," again he looked around and Madame Ribot's lashes flickered, so steady was his glance, "you see, I believe in men or I don't. I back them or I don't, and I'm backing Phil, his character, his judgment--all except----"

he paused, still looking at her. It was not caressing time for the ha.s.sock. "All except some bequests of a few hundred thousand. And I guess," drily, "that Phil won't mind. He might waste it himself keeping up that farm if I don't waste it for him first."

He chuckled as he thought of the farm. Tap-tap went the shoe on the ha.s.sock in a riot of rea.s.surance.

"How I should like to see your farm!" she murmured.

"Perhaps you will. I'd like to show you around," said Peter.

"Delightful! Henriette feels that she already knows it and Longfield."

Longfield was near Lenox and there were delightful people at Lenox. In case that she and Henriette went to the Berkshires they might not find it altogether a bore.

"The American in Henriette's blood is coming out," remarked Peter.

"She resembles you very much; only," Peter smiled a little embarra.s.sedly, "you seem too young to be her mother."

"Do I? I----" Madame Ribot flushed and looked down. Possibly it is not the male s.e.x alone that likes it thick.

"Yes. I could hardly believe it at first," he added, with simple candour.

Tap-tap on the ha.s.sock, oh, most softly and confidentially! Would he make Phil an allowance? No doubt take him into partnership! And Phil would doubtless prefer to live mostly abroad--but not too fast!

"France is beautiful, isn't it?" mused Madame Ribot.

"Well, the people made it that way," he answered. "For sheer beauty as it was in the days of the fellows who got their meal tickets with bows and arrows you can't beat the Berkshires or the Blue Ridge. Yes, it's work, and these French have been at it a long time. They like to see things growing and so do I. Want everybody and everything busy and smiling, including the land. That's pretty good gospel."

"And we who live in Europe enjoy all the beauty which countless generations have made."

"Yes, like Phil will my farm," Peter replied. "But where I get even is in making the farm. Nearly ruined me, that farm!"

"You express everything so well!" exclaimed Madame Ribot admiringly.

"Do I?" Peter said, almost navely. "Well, you know that depends upon whom you are talking to," he added, in another burst of simple candour.

Madame Ribot's eyelashes flickered and tap-tap on the ha.s.sock! His compliments were different from the Count's, but none the less diverting. They flattered her with a sense of personal power in tune with the luxurious humming of the motor.

"It's been a most enjoyable journey," he remarked gallantly, as he a.s.sisted her to alight at Lady Truckleford's; while he thought: "Five hours of that was enough, and I think I gave her as good as she sent!"