Leslie comforted himself that that could not be. The steamer might rot at her moorings and the crew mutiny before any signal for her movement should come from him, and he would take good care before he vanished into the unknown that the same game should not be played with some pawn less susceptible than himself. He would anonymously warn Mr. Maynard of the Maharajah's design to kidnap his daughter, doing it in such a way that he should not be identified with the first abortive attempt. He clung desperately to the hope that he might remain a congenial memory to the unsuspecting girl at his side. As soon as the butler and his satellites had served coffee and retired, Miss Sarah Dymmock straightened herself in her chair, and, with a bird-like glance and a shake of her grey curls, prodded her finger at Nugent. "Now, you high priest of intrigue, I will consult your judgment," was her startling commencement. "The question is, was I right or wrong to eject from the grounds of this mansion an unwashed foreigner whom I caught using violent and insulting language to the French maid whose services I share with my great-niece?" "When I came upon the scene it was Auntie who was using violent and insulting language to the unwashed foreigner," Violet remarked demurely. "Silence, minx," the old lady retorted. "I found the maid, Louise Aubin, in tears in the shrubbery walk, with the creature bullying and threatening her. She explained that the fellow, who is one of the onion-sellers from a French lugger recently arrived at Exmouth full of similar vermin, knew her at her home in Normandy, and was, in fact, her lover there. On discovering her here by accident while disposing of his wares, he wanted to renew the old relations, and has been hanging about for the last month with that intention. He has found out that during the last week Louise has been coquetting with some summer visitor staying in the town. She did not mention this second Lothario's name, but I gathered that he was putting up at the _Plume Hotel_." "Ah!" said Nugent, who had been listening politely, "that does not tell us much, for I was informed this morning that the _Plume_ is full to overflowing just now. Well, dear lady, I cannot presume to criticise your drastic measures. It seems to me to depend on Mademoiselle Aubin's inclinations. If she prefers the Frenchman, you have acted somewhat severely; if the gentleman at the _Plume_ is the favoured swain, you have played the good mistress in protecting your servant from a nuisance." Aunt Sarah, quaintly valuing the opinion of the man she disliked, nodded reflectively. "I'll find out which she likes best," she said. "It won't be the foreigner, I think, she being a girl of sense. She'd be as silly as Violet would have been if she'd accepted that blackamoor who had the impudence to propose to her at the beginning of the London season."