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.