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At the very last moment, when the opening scene was nearly ready, Jean Dalziel fell down a secret staircase that led from the tapestry chamber into Lady Ardmore's boudoir, where the rest of us were dressing. It was a short flight of steps, but as she held a candle, and was carrying her costume, she fell awkwardly, spraining her wrist and ankle.
The hero of the ballad, who had not seen his true love for seven long years, could not have been more amazed at the change in her than was Ronald Macdonald at the sight of the flushed, excited, almost tearful king's daughter on the staircase, Lady Ardmore's diamonds flashing from her crimson satin gown, Lady Ardmore's rubies glowing on her white arms and throat; not Miss Dalziel, as had been arranged, but Francesca, rebellious, reluctant, embarrassed, angrily beautiful and beautifully angry!
He overtook that young lady before she reached the Bentley home. "If the fellow intends to trouble you again, I hope he'll do it before my leave is finished," spoke Dave quietly. "I think I've given him a little lesson, Belle, though there's no telling how long it will last with inferior animals of Ardmore's type." "He's a spiteful fellow, Dave. You must be on your guard against him," Belle urged.
A short time after that he put in an out-of-town telephone call. It was a girlish voice that answered. Late the next night Curlie made his way home along the well-remembered Forest Preserve road. He was riding in the Humming Bird. He had been to Gladys Ardmore's party for two and a chaperon down in the little farmhouse.
I have seen this happen so often in the modern drama that it has long since ceased to be convincing; but though Francesca has witnessed scores of plays and read hundreds of novels, it did not apparently strike her as a theatrical or literary suggestion that Lady Ardmore's daughter should be in love with Mr. Macdonald. The effect of the new point of view was most salutary, on the whole.
They arrived on board the Kittlewake just as the captain, a red-faced old British salt, and the engineer, a silent man who was fully as slim and wiry of build as Curlie himself, were finishing lunch. "Pardon me," said Curlie, "but did you get Mr. Ardmore's wire?" "You're this wireless man, Curlie Carson?" asked the captain. "Yes." "'Is message is 'ere; came this morning."
If you do not make formal application for the appointment of such court of inquiry within the next few days, no further action will be taken in the matter. Very respectfully, As he read, and realized how flat his charge had fallen, Ardmore's face passed through several shades of red. "Of all the government red tape!" he muttered wrathfully.
"It is not the visit at the castle I wish so much, you may be sure," he wrote, "as the fact that Lady Ardmore will make everything pleasant for you. You will like my friend Robin Anstruther, who is Lady Ardmore's youngest brother, and who is going to her to be nursed and coddled after a baddish accident in the hunting-field. He is very sweet-tempered, and will get on well with Francesca "
"Murdered?" he said to himself. "Millionaire's son murdered? Can it be Vincent Ardmore? Did a bullet from my automatic, glancing from the wheel, inflict a mortal wound?" He saw himself behind prison bars in murderer's row. Cold perspiration stood out on his brow as he read in staring headlines: "J. ANSON ARDMORE'S SON BELIEVED MURDERED." "Believed?"
They are followed by Robin Anstruther, Jamie, and Ralph on bicycles, and before long the stalwart figure of Ronald Macdonald appears in the distance, just in time for a cup of tea, which we brew in Lady Ardmore's bath-house on the beach. 'To you I sing, in simple Scottish lays, The lowly train in life's sequester'd scene; The native feelings strong, the guileless ways.
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