friendly greeting became one of real affection. He was nice, this boy;
she liked his honest dark eyes and the expression of his handsome young
mouth.

"Tell me," she began presently, "how is your father?"

"He is well, my father, but very nervous. Poor mother!"

"Poor _mother_?"

"But yes. The concert is to be to-morrow, and he is always in a furious
state of nerves before he plays. He has been terrific all day."

Brigit sat down. "How curious. One would think that he of all people
would be used to playing in public by now," she commented, observing
with a tinge of impatience the effect on him of her head outlined
against the pale moonlight.

He stood for a moment, unconsciously and irresistibly admiring her.
Then, with a little shake of his head, answered her remark. "No, no, he
is most nervous always. It is your amateur who knows no stage-fright.
Papa," he went on, using the name that to English ears sounds so
strangely on grown-up lips, "says he invariably feels as though the
audience were wild beasts going to rush at him and tear him to
pieces--until he has played one number."

"And after the concert?"

As she spoke dinner was announced, and while they went down the passage
to the dining-room at the tail of the little procession, he answered
with a laugh, "Oh, _afterwards_ a child could eat out of his hand. He is
honey and milk, nectar and--_ambrrrrosia_!"

The dinner was noisy. Lady Kingsmead always shrieked, as did Mrs.
Newlyn, and her other guests either bellowed or screamed, with the
exception of Yelverton, who was hungry and said little.

Brigit sat between him and young Joyselle. It was nice to have the boy
next her, but his adoration was too obvious to be altogether
comfortable.

Freddy Newlyn told some new stories, all delightfully vulgar; Carron
gave a realistic _résumé_ of a recent French play.

"Awful rot, isn't it?" queried Yelverton suddenly under cover of a roar
of laughter. "Why the dickens can't they talk quietly?"

"If you dislike it," she inquired unresentfully, "why do you come?"

"I beg pardon, Lady Brigit, I forgot that you belonged here; I always do
forget."

Then Joyselle turned to her, his face so eloquent that she felt like
warning him not to betray his secret. "I--I am so happy to be here," he
stammered.

Her very black, very well-drawn eyebrows drew a trifle closer together,
and with the quickness of his race he saw it.

"Forgive me, Lady Brigit," he said hastily in English. "I am sorry.
And--I will not say it again! Only----"

"Only--you _are_ glad? Well, I'm glad, too," she answered slowly. The
noisier the others grew as dinner progressed, the closer she and this
quiet-voiced boy seemed to draw together.

"Poor old Ponty, too bad he couldn't come," cried Mr. Newlyn, pecking,
sparrow-like, at a scrap of food on his plate. "Anything wrong, Lady
Kingsmead?"

"No, I don't think so. He telephoned just before dinner--_oh_!"

She broke off, and everyone turned towards the door as it opened noisily
to admit a stout, red-faced man, who stood hesitating on the threshold,
not as much apparently from shyness as from a kind of bodily stammer of
movement.

"Ponty!"

"Awfully sorry, Tony," explained Lord Pontefract, advancing towards his
hostess, "awfully sorry, but that idiot Hendricks got a telephone
message wrong, and I thought I couldn't come. So when I found out, I
thought 'better late than never,' though I _had_ dined. Please say
'better late than never.'"

"Better late than never," chanted the whole party dissonantly, and room
was made for the new-comer between Brigit and Yelverton.

"That fool Shover nearly broke my neck, too," he confided, sitting down
and lowering his voice confidentially. "I--I thought for a second I
should never see you again."

She looked at him out of the corners of her eyes. He had been drinking.
No one had ever seen Oscar Pontefract drunk, but as time went on the
honourable body of those who had ever seen him perfectly sober
diminished rapidly.

"Haven't seen you for ten days. Damnedest ten days I ever lived
through," he continued, helping himself to whisky and soda, "and most
infernal ten nights, too. Can't sleep for thinking of you," he added
hastily, as she at last turned and looked full at him.

She was twenty-five, and had lived in this _milieu_ for the past seven
years. It had begun by disgusting her, then for a time she had been
indifferent to it, and now for the last year it had been growing
steadily unbearable.

"_Dites donc_, Lady Brigit," began Joyselle in her left ear, and as she
listened to him she instinctively drew away from Pontefract, closer to
him. At dessert Kingsmead came sauntering in, less with the air of a
little boy allowed to appear with the fruit than of a gently interested
gentleman come to take a look at the strange beasts it amused him to
keep in a remote corner of his park.

He ate fruit in, to the unaccustomed eye, alarming quantities, and his
mother's guests discussed him exactly as if he had not been there.

A very plain little boy, Kingsmead, with stiff fair hair and many
freckles. But for his mouth a most unremarkable-looking person, for his
eyes, quick as those of a lizard, were pale blue in colour, and small.
But his mouth turned up at the corners in a peculiar and faun-like way,
and gave much character to his face, which was otherwise impassive as
well as ugly.

"Boy ought to go to school," growled Lord Pontefract.

Lady Kingsmead shrugged her shoulders. "Of course he ought," she
assented shrilly, "but what am I to do? He simply won't go, will you,
Tommy?"

"No, I believe in self-education. The intelligent child gleans more from
the company and conversation of his elders----" Gravely he paused and
gazed round the table at the meaningless faces of most of those present.

The Cassowary burst into a scream of laughter. "Oh, Tommy, you _are_
such a quaint little being," she cried; "isn't he, Gerald?"

"Beastly child. Kingsmead always was an ass, but no one would have
believed that even _he_ could be such an imbecile as to leave that boy
entirely in his wife's hands."

"_So_ ducky, I always think him, though not pretty," returned the
Cassowary.

As they left the dining-room Kingsmead whispered to his sister, "I say,
Bicky, look out for Ponty. He's a bit boiled."




CHAPTER THREE


"If I do, they will say that I am in love with some man who either won't
have me, or is already married, or that I am forced to, by my debts. If
I don't--then this will go on indefinitely, and some fine day I shall
jump into the carp-pond and drown in four feet of nasty, slimy water."

Brigit Mead stood behind the heavy curtains by an open window and
whispered the above reflections to herself. It was a trick she had in
moments of intense concentration, and the sharp, hissing sound of the
last words was so distinct that she involuntarily turned to see that she
had not been overheard.

No, it was all right, everyone was busy with the preparations for the
evening's work, except Joyselle, who sat at the piano and was playing,
very softly, a little thing of Grieg's.

The great hall looked almost empty in spite of its nine occupants, and
the electric lamps threw little pools of light on the polished floor.

It might have been a cheerless place enough, for one unintelligent
Georgian Kingsmead had added to its austerity of church-like painted
windows a very awful row of glossy marble pillars, that stood as if
aware of their own ugliness, holding up a quite unnecessary and
appallingly hideous gallery.

Luckily, however, the late Lord Kingsmead, while not possessing enough
initiative to do away with the horrors perpetuated by his ancestors, was
a man of some taste, and had, by the means of gorgeous Eastern carpets,
skilful overhead lighting, and some fine hangings, transformed the place
into a very comfortable and livable one.

A huge fire burned under the splendid carved chimney-piece, and Brigit,
turning from the cool moonlight to the interior, watched it with a
certain sense of artistic pleasure. It was a dear old house, Kingsmead,
and with money--oh, yes, oh, yes, money! When Tommy was grown, what kind
of a man would he be? She shuddered.

And there, staring at her across a table on which he was leaning to
perfect his not quite faultless balance, stood Pontefract, money, so far
as she was concerned, personified.

He owned mines in Cornwall, a highly successful motor-factory, a big
London newspaper, a house in Grosvenor Square, and Pomfret Abbey.

Also he owned an ever-thirsting palate, a fat red neck, red-rimmed eyes,
and a bald head.

She looked at him with the absent-minded deliberation that so annoyed
many people. He was rather awful in many ways, but he was a kind man,
his temper was good, and he would doubtless be an amiable, manageable
husband.

"Brigit,--let's go out, I,--there is something I want to tell you." His
voice shook a little with real emotion, and though he had undoubtedly
drunk more than was good for him, there was about the man a certain
dignity, compounded of his breeding, his respect for her, and his
sincerity.

She did not move, and her small, narrow face went white. He would take
her--wherever she asked him; she would be able to fly away from her
mother and her mother's friends. After a long pause, which he bore well,
she bowed her head slowly. "Yes, I will get a scarf," and leaving him
she left the room. Her face was set and a little sullen as she came back
with a long silk scarf on her arm. Carron met her near the door. "Made
up your mind, have you?" he asked, with deliberate insolence. "Better
wait till to-morrow, my dear--he's half drunk."

She hated Carron. Hated him with an intensity that few women know. At
that moment she would have liked to kill him. But knowing a better
weapon, and rejoicing in her cruelty, she used it. "Poor old Gerald,"
she said, smiling at him, "no man over fifty can afford the luxury of
jealousy."

Then she joined Pontefract.

He made his proposal succinctly and well, and without any confusion she
accepted him. "No--you may not kiss me to-night," she added. "You may
come for that--to-morrow. Now would you mind going? I--I want to be
alone."

Quite humbly, hardly daring to believe in his good fortune, he left her,
and she wandered aimlessly over the grass towards the carp-pond. "Nasty,
slimy water," she said aloud, "you have lost me!"

Joyselle had stopped playing, and through the open windows only a very
subdued murmur of voices came. Even Bridge has its uses. The night was
perfect, and the serene moon sailed high under a scrap of cloud like a
wing. The old house, most beautiful, looked, among its surrounding
trees, secluded and protected.

"It looks like a home," thought the girl bitterly.

And then young Joyselle joined her.

"May I come? Shall I bother you?"

"You may come; and you never bother me."

His youthful face was pleasant to look at; the dominating expression of
it was one of sunny sweetness. Would Tommy grow to be as nice a young
man?

Tommy, that old person, was, she knew, perched astride a chair near the
Bridge table, picking up, with uncanny shrewdness, all sorts of tips
about the great game, as he picked up knowledge about everything that
came his way. Up to this, his varied stock of information had not hurt
him. Later--who could tell?

"Where is Tommy?" she asked miserably.

"Watching the Bridge. Why are you unhappy?" His dark eyes were bent
imploringly on hers. "I--I can't bear to see you suffer."

"Oh, _mon Dieu, je ne souffre pas_! That is saying far too much. I----"

"Was it Pontefract?"

"No, oh, no. Ponty and I are very good friends," she returned absently.
And then she remembered. She was going to marry Ponty!

"Let's walk to the sun-dial and see what time it is by the moon," she
suggested abruptly.

But at the sun-dial he insisted further, always gentle and apologetic,
but always bent on having an answer to his question.

"You are not going to marry him?" he asked.

"Who told you I was?"

"No one."

"Oh!"

"Well, _are_ you?"

His head fairly swam as he looked at her in the full moonlight. "What
made you think of it?" she returned.

"Tommy--told me not to interrupt you--and him."

"Well--it's true."

He was young, and French, and she was beautiful and he was desperately
in love with her. Kneeling suddenly on the damp grass, he buried his
face in his arms as they lay limply across the sun-dial. There was a
long pause. He did not sob, he was quite still, but every line of him
proclaimed unspeakable agony.

"Poor boy," she said gently.

Then he rose. "I am not a boy," he declared, his chin twitching but his
voice firm, "and I love you. He is old and--_c'est un vieux roué_. I at
least am young and I have lived a clean life."

He asked her no question, but she paused to consider. "I know, I
understand," he continued, "you hate this life, you are bored and sick
of it all; you do not love your mother. _Mon Dieu, ne pas pouvoir aimer
sa mère!_ And you want to get away. Then--marry me instead. I am not so
rich, but I am rich. And, ah, I love you--_je t'aime_."

Poor Pontefract, leaning back in his big Mercedes trying to realise his
bliss, was jilted before Brigit had spoken a word. Like a flash, his
image seemed to stand before her, beside the delightful boy-man whose
youth and niceness pleaded so strongly to her. She did not consider that
breaking her word was not fair play, she had no thought of pity for
Pontefract. She loved nobody, and therefore thought solely of herself.
This boy was right. She would be happier with him than with poor, old,
fat Ponty. So poor, old, fat Ponty went to the wall, and putting her
hands into Joyselle's, she said slowly:

"Very well--I will. I will marry you. Only--you must know that I am an
odious person, selfish and moody, and----"

But she could not finish her sentence, because Joyselle had her in his
arms and was kissing her.

"I will be your servant and your slave," he told her, with very bad
judgment but much sincerity. "I will serve you on my knees."

"Now you must--buck up--and not let them see to-night. Mother will be
cross at first. And--I must write Ponty before we tell."

Her practical tone struck chill on Joyselle's glowing young ear, but he
followed her obediently to the house. As they reached the door the
opening bar of Mendelssohn's Wedding March rang out, played with a
mastery of the pianola that, in that house, only Kingsmead was capable
of.

On entering, Brigit's face was scarlet. She knew that her brother was
welcoming the wrong bridegroom. And it suddenly occurred to her that it
was awkward to be engaged to two men at once.

"I say----" began Tommy as he saw Joyselle, and she interrupted him
hastily. "Play something of Sinding's, dear," she said, and the boy
complied. But his eye was horribly knowing, and hard to bear.




CHAPTER FOUR


Lady Brigit leaned back in her corner and surveyed the otherwise empty
compartment with a sigh of relief. She knew that her face still bore
signs of the anger roused by her mother in their recent interview, and
she felt the necessity of looking as savage as she felt.

And she felt very savage indeed. If an American Indian--an idealised,
poeticised American Indian--could be invested with the beauty that does
not belong to the red races and yet which, if perfected on the lines of
beauty suggested by some of the nobler specimens of the nobler tribes,
she might look like Brigit Mead. The girl had a clean-cutness of
feature, a thin compactness of build, a stag-like carriage of her small
head that, together with her almost bronze skin and coal-black hair,
gave her an air remarkably and arrestingly un-English. The picture in
the Luxembourg gallery, a typically French, subtle, secretive face,
gives the expression of her face and the strange gleam in the long eyes.
But it, the face in the picture, is overcivilised, whereas Brigit looked
untamed and resentful.

She wore, for the weather had changed with the unpleasant capriciousness
of an elderly coquette, a warm, close-fitting black coat and skirt and a
small black toque. Round her neck clung to its own tail, as if in a
despairing attempt to find out what had happened to its own anatomy, a
little sable boa. She had a dressing-case and an umbrella, both of them
characteristically uncumbersome and light, and several newspapers and a
book.

Her journey was not to be a long one. She was going to change trains in
London and go half an hour into Surrey to spend a few days with a
friend. Lady Kingsmead, when told of the speedy jilting of the desirable
Pontefract, and the subsequent acceptance of young Joyselle, had been
disagreeable.

"It is ridiculous, and everyone will say you are cradle-snatching," she
had said. "When you are forty he will be thirty-seven--almost a boy
still."

"Dearest mamma," returned the girl with a very unfilial lift of her
upper lip, "forty is--_youth_!"

"And for you to marry a nobody; the son of nobody knows whom!"

"But everybody knows who his father is--which is rather distinguished
nowadays!"

Then Lady Kingsmead, as was natural, quite lost her temper and stormed.
Brigit was an idiot, a fool, a beastly little creature to do such a
thing. Ponty was a gentleman, at least, whereas----

"Whereas Théo is a delightful, nice, perfectly presentable young man,
and the son of the greatest violinist of the century."

"Ah, bah! of the last ten years, yes."

"Of the century. As to Ponty--why don't you marry him yourself? Anyone
could marry Ponty!"

Then, suddenly ashamed of herself, the girl had begged her mother's
pardon, but Lady Kingsmead was not of those to whom the crowning charm
of graceful forgiveness has been vouchsafed, and the battle went on. To
end it, Brigit announced her intention of going to stop with her friend
Pam de Lensky, and without more ado, or a word of good-bye, had left the
house.

Now, though ashamed, or possibly because she was ashamed, her anger
against her mother refused to subside, but grew stronger and bitterer as
the train rushed through the dull afternoon Londonwards.

"Why shouldn't I marry whom I choose? What has she ever done for me that
gives her a right to dictate to me? And I could _kill_ Gerald." A dark
flush crept up her cheeks and her mouth twisted furiously. For Carron
had dared to waylay her in the passage on her way to her room, and his
remarks had not been of a kind calculated to quiet her. Women who have
loved are sorry for men who love them, but women who do not know what
the word means are either amused or irritated by it. The conversation,
carried on in a careful undertone, and lasting only about five minutes,
was one that the girl would never, she knew, be able to forget, and one
that neither she nor the man could ever make even a pretence of
forgiving.

Far too excited and annoyed to read, she watched with unseeing eyes the
swift flight of the familiar landscape, and then suddenly, as the train
stopped, came to herself with a start. Victoria!

Mechanically, her thick chiffon veil over her face, she looked after
her luggage, took a hansom, and drove down Victoria Street, past the
Abbey, over Westminster Bridge, and so to Waterloo Station.

London was dull, but its dulness, grey and soft, was being mitigated by
a gradual and beautiful blossoming of lights--lights reddish, golden,
and clear white. People hurried along the streets, hansoms jingled and
passed by, buses and vans blocked the view and then, with elephantine
deliberateness, ambled on. Motors of all kinds grunted and jingled, from
the opulent, throaty-voiced ones, that chuckle as if they were fed on
turtle-soup, to the cheap variety, that sound as they pass like an
old-fashioned tinsmith's waggon.

And the combined effect of all these varied sounds was so different from
the sound of Paris, or New York, or Berlin, that an intelligent blind
man would have known where he was, if softly and undisturbingly dropped
from a balloon to a safe street corner.

Brigit Mead had no particular love for the old town, just as she had no
particular love for her little brother's country-house. She was too
bored to care in the least where she was, and only a few people in the
world could soothe her vexed and discontented mind to a sense of calm.
The woman to visit whom she was on her way was one of these, and as she
bought her ticket and made her way to the train a little of her
ill-temper died away. "Good old Pam," she whispered under her veil,
"_she_ will be glad I didn't take Ponty!"

Then there would be the children--six-years-old Pammy, the De Lenskys'
adopted child, and their own little Eliza and Thaddy--the latter a
delicious, roundabout person of eighteen months, the very feel of whom
was comforting.

"An empty carriage, if there is one, please," she asked the guard, and
he opened a door and helped her into a still unlit compartment. She
closed the door and, letting down the glass, leaned her head on her hand
and watched, through the veil she always wore when travelling as a
protection against impertinent and boring admiration, the little crowd
on the platform.

Most of them looked, thank Heaven, second class--she would be alone. And
then, just at the last, three men, all apparently very much excited and
speaking French very loudly, rushed at her door and tore it open.
"_Adieu donc, cher maître_"--"_Bon voyage_"--"_Au 'voir, mes
enfants--merci infiniment_"--"_Mille tendresses à Eugenie!_"

And the train had started, leaving Brigit alone in the dusk with a very
big man in a fur-collared overcoat and a long box, that he deposited
with much care on the seat, humming to himself as he did so. Then he sat
down and, taking off his broad-brimmed felt hat, wiped his forehead and
face with a handkerchief that smelt strongly of violets.

Lady Brigit shrank fastidiously into her corner. Another thing to bore
her. She was of those women who always hate their fellow-travellers and
resent their existence. And this man was too big, there was too much fur
on his coat, too much scent on his handkerchief. "_Salut demeure chaste
et pure_," he began singing, suddenly, apparently quite unconscious of
his companion's presence. "_Salut demeure_----" It was a high baritone
voice, sweet and round, and his r's were like Théo Joyselle's. Brigit
smiled. Dear Théo! Her mother could be as nasty as she liked, but they
would be happy in spite of her. And then, as in the beginning of the
world, it was light, and the girl recognised in her suddenly silent
_vis-à-vis_ the man who was to be her father-in-law, Victor Joyselle.

He had taken off his hat, and his dark, handsome, excited face was
distinctly visible under the untidy, slightly curly mass of peculiarly
silky, silver-grey hair. Brigit drew a deep breath. Victor Joyselle! She
had often heard him play. Those were the hands, in the brown dogskin
gloves, that worked such witchery with his violin. That was the violin
in the shabby box beside him. His dark eyes, over which the lids dropped
at the outer corners, were now fixed on hers, he was trying to see
through her veil. He was a magnificent creature, even now, with his
youth behind him: his big nose had fine cut, sensitive nostrils, his
mouth under a big moustache was well-cut and serene, and his strong chin
was softened by a dimple. And he was to be--her father-in-law.

For the first time for months the girl felt the youth and sense of fun
stir in her. Then he spoke--irrepressibly, as if he could not help it.

"I beg your pardon, madame, for singing," he burst out, "I--forgot that
I was not alone."

She bowed without speaking. Madame!

"May I open the other window?" he pursued, rising restlessly and tearing
off his gloves as if they hurt him, thereby revealing a large diamond on
the little finger of his right--the bow-hand.

"Yes."

He did so, and then sat down, and taking an open telegram from his
pocket, read it through several times, his nostrils quivering, his mouth
dimpling in an uncontrollable and enchanting smile. Then again, as if
impelled by some superior force, he turned to her and said: "I am not a
lunatic, madame. I am Victor Joyselle. I have played--my very best this
afternoon, and my son, _mon bébé_--is engaged to the most beautiful
woman in England!"

Inspired to a dramatic act totally foreign to her nature, impelled by
his sheer strength of imagination and his buoyant personality, Lady
Brigit Mead threw back her veil.

"Théo is engaged--to me," she answered.




CHAPTER FIVE


Joyselle stared at her, his eyes like two lamps. Then rushing at her, he
took her hands in his and bent over her. "Good God! Good God!" he cried
rapidly in French, "_you_ are Lady Brigit Mead? You--you Diana--you
_splendeur de femme_? But I dream--I dream!"

"Indeed, no, I am Brigit Mead, M. Joyselle,"--she was laughing, laughing
with delightful amusement. He was too delicious! Then she added hastily,
"You are crushing my hands!"

Sitting down by her, he patted her reddened fingers tenderly. "_Chère
enfant, chère enfant_, forgive an old papa--_qui t'a fait bobo_--and you
are actually going to marry my Théo?"

"I am."

"Then," with a solemnity that was as overwhelming as his joy, he
returned, bowing his head as if in church, "_il a une sacrée chance_. He
is--the luckiest boy in the world."

Brigit had forgotten what boredom meant. This spontaneous, warm-hearted
person with--oh, horror,--a white satin tie, and a low, turned-down
collar, filled her with the gentlest and most affectionate amusement.
And as he was to be her father-in-law, why not enjoy him? "It is kind
of you to be so pleased," she said, "it is very interesting, our meeting
like this----"

"Interesting! It is--romance, my dear, romance, of the most unusual. And
you are so beautiful that I cannot look away from you. He told me you
were beautiful--yes--but I had pictured to myself a pink and white miss
with a head as big as a pumpkin--and, just Heaven--a 'drawing-room
voice.' Tell me, oh, tell me, _fille adorée_, that you do not sing!"

His anxiety was perfectly sincere, and she hastened to reassure him.
"Indeed, I do not."

"Nor play--not even 'simple little things,' and 'coon-songs'?"

"Nothing."

"God be praised!" he returned with a sort of whimsical reverence, in
French. "Then you are perfect."

"Indeed I am not. Oh, I _really_ am not!" Before she knew what he was
about to do, he had kissed her forehead, and then, as the train stopped,
he rushed at the window.

"But where are you going?" he cried, so rapidly that she hardly
understood him. "Why are you--why are we both--going away from London?
We must go _home_--to my house--to my wife."

"I am going to make a visit----"

"_Mais non, mais non, mais non_--come, there is a train going to
London--hurry, we will go back. You will telegraph your friends. This
evening--the betrothal evening, you must spend with us. Come, hurry, or
we shall be too late."

"But I cannot, it is impossible," she protested weakly, as, he took her
dressing-case and umbrella from the seat, after scrambling into his
furry coat. "My friend is expecting me!"

"Ta, ta, ta, ta, ta! Come, _ma fille, bella signorina_, the train is
just there--I will telegraph your friend. Let me help you, _comme ça, ça
y est_!"

And almost before she knew what had happened, they were in the other
train speeding back to town.

"Théo is at home--he went to tell his mother," Joyselle said, nearly
braining an old lady with his violin-case as he swung round to speak.
"And they will be sitting by the fire, and I--who was going to spend the
night at the Duke of Cumberland's--will appear, and after we have
embraced, hey, presto--I produce you--Diana--his _adorée_--my daughter."

The old lady, who was engaged to nobody (and who, what was much worse,
never had been), resented his loud voice and his way of handling his
violin-case as if it had been a baby. "Sir," she said, "you are crowding
me."

"_Sacré nom d'une pipe_--I beg your pardon, madame, but you must not
push that box. You must not _touch_ it," he returned, all his smiles
gone and a ferocious frown joining his big black eyebrows. "It contains
my violin, madame, my Amati!"

Brigit, convulsed with laughter, laid her hand on his arm as if she had
known him for years, and he became like a lamb at her touch.

"I beg your pardon, madame," he added, smiling angelically (and an
angelic smile on a dark, middle-aged face is a very winning thing), "I
will put it over here."

Then, his beloved fiddle safe from profane touch, he again turned to