"You yourself
do not now swear faith to the tricolour or the fleur-de-lis."
He flushed. She had touched a tender nerve.
"I am a Frenchman always," he rejoined angrily. "I hate the English.
I spit on the English flag."
"Yes, I've heard you are an anarchist," she rejoined. "A man with no
country and with a flag that belongs to no country--quelle affaire et
quelle drolerie!"
She laughed. Taken aback in spite of his anger, he stared at her. How
good her French accent was! If she would only speak altogether in that
beloved language, he could smother much malice. She was beautiful and--
well, who could tell? Ingolby was wounded and blind, maybe for ever, and
women are always with the top dog--that was his theory. Perhaps her
apparent dislike of him was only a mood. Many women that he had
conquered had been just like that. They had begun by disliking him--from
Lil Sarnia down--and had ended by being his. This girl would never be
his in the way that the others had been, but--who could tell?--perhaps he
would think enough of her to marry her? Anyway, it was worth while
making such a beauty care for him. The other kind of women were easy
enough to get, and it would be a piquant thing to have one irreproachable
affaire.
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