The moment that Fanny left the room, the doctor addressed his friend in
English, with his eye on the door: "News for you, my boy! We are in a
pretty pickle--Lady Harry's maid understands French."
"Quite impossible," Lord Harry declared.
"We will put that to the test," Mr. Vimpany answered. "Watch her when
she comes in again."
"What are you going to do."
"I am going to insult her in French. Observe the result."
In another minute Fanny returned with the fresh water. As she placed
the glass jug before Mr. Vimpany he suddenly laid his hand on her arm
and looked her straight in the face. "Vous nous avez mis dedans,
drolesse!"* he said.
*In English: "You have taken us in, you jade!"
An uncontrollable look of mingled rage and fear made its plain
confession in Fanny's face. She had been discovered; she had heard
herself called "drolesse;" she stood before the two men self-condemned.
Her angry master threatened her with instant dismissal from the house.
The doctor interfered.
"No, no," he said; "you mustn't deprive Lady Harry, at a moment's
notice, of her maid. Such a clever maid, too," he added with his
rascally smile. "An accomplished person, who understands French, and is
too modest to own it!"
The doctor had led Fanny through many a weary and unrewarded walk when
she had followed him to the hospitals; he had now inflicted a
deliberate insult by calling her "drolesse" and he had completed the
sum of his offences by talking contemptuously of her modesty and her
mastery of the French language. The woman's detestation of him, which
under ordinary circumstances she might have attempted to conceal, was
urged into audaciously asserting itself by the strong excitement that
now possessed her. Driven to bay, Fanny had made up her mind to
discover the conspiracy of which Mr. Vimpany was the animating spirit,
by a method daring enough to be worthy of the doctor himself.
"My knowledge of French has told me something," she said. "I have just
heard, Mr. Vimpany, that you want a nurse for your invalid gentleman.
With my lord's permission, suppose you try Me?"
Fanny's audacity was more than her master's patience could endure. He
ordered her to leave the room.
The peace-making doctor interfered again: "My dear lord, let me beg you
will not be too hard on the young woman." He turned to Fanny, with an
effort to look indulgent, which ended in the reappearance of his
rascally smile. "Thank you, my dear, for your proposal," he said; "I
will let you know if we accept it, to-morrow."