twice a week between these ports. He would then go on to Yarmouth by stage-coach, and make all inquiries for his baby. His difficulty was, he did not know the language, but living near the Chateau de Thorens was a Monsieur de Courcy, who had married an English wife, and spoke English very well. He was intimate with the De Thorens, and the baron hoped he might be able to help him in his trouble.
Accordingly he called on the De Courcys at once, and, to his great relief, Monsieur de Courcy offered to go to Yarmouth with him, while Madame de Courcy suggested that the baroness should come and stay with her during their husbands' absence, for the chateau was a very gloomy place for the poor young mother while the shadow of death rested upon it. Arnaud jumped at this, for he had never been separated from his wife since their marriage, and he would far rather leave her with this pretty young English lady than at the chateau, while his mother's grief for Léon saddened the whole household. It was easy to account for his journey to England, by saying that he was going to get particulars of the accident from the place off which it happened. This would seem only natural to Mathilde, who must on no account be told that he had any hope of finding the child. She had accepted the news of its death without questioning it, and it was far better to let her continue under this impression than to raise fresh hopes, which, after all, might never be realised, and if he could only persuade her to come to Parc du Baffy while he was away he would feel quite happy about her.
Madame de Courcy and the baroness were on intimate terms with each other, although Madame de Courcy was a staunch Protestant, and both the baron and baroness bigoted Romanists; but the great attraction to Mathilde, as Madame de Courcy guessed, would be her child, a beautiful boy of three years old, in whom the baroness had delighted until her own baby was born and absorbed all her time and affection. Knowing this, Madame de Courcy offered to send her boy to the chateau with the baron, hoping to inveigle the baroness to return with him to Parc du Baffy, a manoeuvre which succeeded admirably, for Mathilde, not having seen the little Rex for some weeks, was so enraptured with him that she could not part with him, and as Madame de Courcy could not be asked to spare her child as well as her husband, the baroness consented to go and stay at the Parc while the baron was away. The little Rex was too old to remind her of her own baby, and his pretty mixture of French and English amused her immensely, and for the moment charmed away her sorrow. Had she known the real object of her husband's visit to England, the suspense and anxiety would have made her seriously ill; not knowing it, the change and Rex's society did her good, so that Madame de Courcy was able, after a day or two, to write to the baron and tell him his wife was certainly better and more cheerful since she had been at the Parc du Baffy.
Meanwhile the baron and M. de Courcy reached Yarmouth safely, and learned the day and hour on which the Hirondelle arrived and also left Yarmouth, and that the cause of her remaining so long there was the absconding of an English sailor, named, or, at all events, calling himself, John Smith. The baron was more elated than ever at hearing this, for he knew the Englishman was to place the baby out to nurse, and if he were safe, the chances were that the child was too; but when, after having run two or three John Smiths to earth and discovered that they bore no resemblance to the original, it became evident that the real John Smith had made himself scarce, and was probably not John Smith at all, the baron's hopes of recovering the child again fell, though he could not abandon the idea that if he could only find the runaway sailor he should hear some news of the child. The wish was, perhaps, father to the thought, but he could not help thinking the child was not on board the Hirondelle when she went down, now that he found the English carpenter had left the yacht at Yarmouth. But the baron felt his inability to speak English a great drawback to prosecuting his inquiries as fully as he would have liked, although M. de Courcy was very kind and did all any friend could have been expected to do; still, it was not the same as
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