Devils Cub Part III

Mary meets Vidal at the rendevous, wearing a mask to hide her face. He takes her to an inn to dine before they go on board ship, and until then she manages to fool him that she is Sophia. When he takes her mask off, she tells him that she and Sophia thought up this prank to make him realise that Sophy is not as easy as he thought she was.. and that he can be easily fooled. She acts as if she were as vulgar and silly as Sophy and Dominic loses his temper badly. He tells her she has come away with him and he'll take her as his mistress since she has shown that she is just as capable as SOphia of being vulgar and silly and not virtuous. He threatens to make her drunk, if she will not come willingly. She finally agrees to go, hoping to escape from him later. On the voyage, she is sick and Dominic is surprisingly kind, but when they get to France, he tries to seduce her and she shoots him with a pistol she has stolen from his coat. Dominic is not badly hurt but enough to startle him and make him realise that Mary is not the silly wanton flirt that she was playing. They have to stay in the inn for a few days for him to recover from his wound, and he now apologises and tells her that he is sorry and will make sure she does not suffer from this episode. Mary however realises that she was very foolish to put herself in his power and that its not going to be easy to sort this tangle out. As they talk, she tells him that her father's family are gentry and that her grandfather is Sir Giles Challoner, an old soldier. VIdal says that there's nothing to be done but to get married, as old Challoner is a martinet and a friend of his father's. Mary refuses to marry him because she realises that she cares for him, in spite of his faults and to be in a forced marriage with him, and disapproved of by his family, would be hard for her.