I had seen Jack coming, long enough to have counted ten before he came.  But I didn’t count ten.  I just let him come.

Bertie could not speak:  he could only gurgle.  And if I had been a Roman lady in the amphitheatre of Nimes, or somewhere, I’m afraid I should have wanted to turn my thumb down.

“What was the beast threatening you with?” Jack wanted to know.

“The beast was threatening to make Lady Turnour think I’d stolen this brooch, which he’d taken himself,” I panted, through the beatings of my heart.

“If you didn’t kiss him?”

“Yes.  And he was going to do lots of other horrid things, too.  Tell Monsieur Charretier—­and let my cousins come and find me at the Hotel Athenee, in Paris, and—­”

“He won’t do any of them.  But there are several things I am going to do to him.  Go away, my child.  Run off to the house, as quick as you can.”

I gasped.  “What are you going to do to him?”

“Don’t worry.  I shan’t hurt him nearly as much as he deserves.  I’m only going to do what the Head must have neglected to do to him at school.”

[Illustration:  “Jack’s hand, inside Mr. Stokes’s beautiful, tall collar, shook Bertie back and forth till his teeth chattered like castanets”]

Bertie had come out into the woods with a neat little stick, which during part of our conversation he had tucked jauntily under his arm.  It now lay on the ground.  I saw Jack glance at it.

“Ah!”—­I faltered.  “Do—­do you think you’d better?”

“I know I had.  Go, child.”

I went.

I had great faith in Jack, faith that he knew what was best for everyone.

CHAPTER XXXI

Unfortunately I forgot to ask for instructions as to how I should behave when I came to the hotel.  And I had the bursting sun still in my hand.

I thought things over, as well as I could with a pounding pulse for every square inch in my body.

If I were a rabbit, I could scurry into my hole and “lay low” while other people fought out their destiny and arranged mine; but being a girl, tingling with my share of American pluck, and blazing with French fire, rabbits seemed to me at the instant only worthy of being made into pie.

Bertie, at this moment, was being made into pie—­humble pie; and I don’t doubt that the chauffeur, whom he had consistently tortured (because of me) would make him eat a large slice of himself when the humble pie was finished—­also because of me.  And because it was because of me, I knocked at the Turnours’ sitting-room door with a bold, brave knock, as if I thought myself their social equal.

They had had tea, and were sitting about, looking graceful in the expectation of seeing Bertie and his French friend.

It was a disappointment to her ladyship to see only me, and she showed it with a frown, but Sir Samuel looked up kindly, as usual.