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Updated: July 15, 2025
He's a nephew of Madame de Blanchemain's, it seems; and on coming back from foreign service in Algeria, or somewhere, he dutifully paused to visit his relative. Of course it occurs to me, did Madame de Blanchemain write and intimate that she would have in the house a pretty little Anglo-French heiress, with no inconvenient relatives, unless one counts the Dragon?
"Somewhere between twenty-nine and thirty, I believe," he laughed. "And in such a romantic environment, and not on account of a woman! It's downright unnatural," she declared. "It's flat treason against the kingly state of youth." "I'm awfully sorry," said John. "Yet, after all, what's the good of repining? Nothing could happen even if there were a woman." Lady Blanchemain looked alarmed.
There was a sound of wheels on gravel, of horses' hoofs on stone, and Lady Blanchemain's great high-swung barouche, rolling superbly forth from the avenue, drew up before the Castle, Lady Blanchemain herself, big and soft and sumptuous in silks and laces, under a much-befurbelowed, much-befringed, lavender-hued silk sunshade, occupying the seat of honour.
"I am very glad to have made your acquaintance," she said, "and I hope this may not be our last meeting. I'm afraid I ought now to be hastening back to Roccadoro. I wonder whether you will have the kindness, when you see him, to convey my parting benediction to Mr. Blanchemain. Oh, no, I would not let him be wakened, not for worlds. Thank you. Good-bye."
"It is lovely," she exclaimed, fervently, in a whisper, "lovely. And only a generation of blind-worms," was her after-thought, "could discern in it the slightest resemblance to the drop-scene of a theatre." Big, humorous, emotional, imperious, but, above all, interested and sociable Lady Blanchemain: do you know her, I wonder? Her billowy white hair?
"Does the Prince of Zelt-Neuminster take in boarders?" she inquired, her nose in the air. "Not exactly," said John. "But the Parroco of Sant' Alessina does. I board at the presbytery." "Oh," said Lady Blanchemain, beginning to see light, while her eyebrows went up, went down. "You board at the presbytery?" "For six francs fifty a day wine included," chuckled John.
This situation, for the heir to the barony of Blanchemain, is of course absurd, and must, Lady Blanchemain is sure, be due entirely to an oversight on his lordship's part. She ventures, therefore, with all respect, to bring it to his notice." So!
She's the young limb o' mischief for whom I ravaged your stores of marchpane. She's the niece of the parroco." "Hum!" said Lady Blanchemain. "Why does she call you what was it? Prospero?" "She's an optimist. She's a bird of good omen," answered John. "She's satisfied herself, by consulting an oracle, that Fortune has favours up her sleeve for me.
Proud that her sister's school had moulded a celebrity, Mademoiselle chatted away about Ellaline, saying what a dear child she was, how sorry Madame was to part from her, and how Madame de Blanchemain, Ellaline's chère marraine, at St. Cloud, must be missing her mignonne at this very moment. It goes without saying that Mr. Dick's next step took him at a single stride to St. Cloud.
"Besides," John carelessly threw out, "he's a baronet." Lady Blanchemain sat up. "A baronet?" she said. "An American?" "Alas, yes," said John, "a mere American. And one of the earliest creations, by James the First, no less. His patent dates from 1612. But he doesn't use the title. He regards it, he pretends, as merged in a higher dignity." "What higher dignity?" asked the lady, frowning.
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