Do you want to kill us? What has Maude done to you that you
behave in this way?"
"I do think you must be going mad!" cried Lord Hartledon, in
bewilderment; "and I hope you'll forgive me for saying so. I--"
"Go and change your clothes!" was all she could reiterate. "Every minute
you stand in them is fraught with danger. If you choose to die yourself,
it's downright wicked to bring death to us. Oh, go, that I may get out of
here."
Lord Hartledon, to pacify her, left the room, and the countess-dowager
rushed forth and bolted herself into her own apartments.
Was she mad, or making a display of affectation, or genuinely afraid?
wondered Lord Hartledon aloud, as he went up to his chamber. Hedges gave
it as his opinion that she was really afraid, because she had been as bad
as this when she first heard of the illness, before his lordship arrived.
Val retired to rest laughing: it was a good joke to him.
But it was no joke to the countess-dowager, as he found to his cost when
the morning came. She got him out of his chamber betimes, and commenced a
"fumigating" process. The clothes he had worn she insisted should be
burnt; pleading so piteously that he yielded in his good nature.
But there was to be a battle on another score. She forbade him, in the
most positive terms, to go again to the Rectory--to approach within
half-a-mile of it. Lord Hartledon civilly told her he could not comply;
he hinted that if her alarms were so great, she had better leave the
place until all danger was over, and thereby nearly entailed on himself
another war-dance.
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