“Sit down, Madame,” she said imperiously, and Sylvia meekly obeyed.
The old lady fixed her eyes with an appraising gaze on her godson’s English friend.
“Permit me to embrace you,” she exclaimed suddenly. “You are a very pretty creature! And though no doubt young lips often tell you this, the compliments of the old have the merit of being quite sincere!”
She bent down, and Sylvia, to her confusion and surprise, felt her cheeks lightly kissed by the withered lips of Paul de Virieu’s godmother.
“Madame Bailey’s rouge is natural; it does not come off!” the old lady exclaimed, and a smile crept over her parchment-coloured face. “Not but what a great deal of nonsense is talked about the usage of rouge, my dear children! There is no harm in supplementing the niggardly gifts of nature. You, for instance, Marie-Anne, would look all the better for a little rouge!” She spoke in a high, quavering voice.
The Duchesse smiled. Her brother had always been the old Marquise’s favourite.
“But I should feel so ashamed if it came off,” she said lightly; “if, for instance, I felt one of my cheeks growing pale while the other remained bright red?”
“That would never happen if you used what I have often told you is the only rouge a lady should use, that is, the sap of the geranium blossom—that gives an absolutely natural tint to the skin, and my own dear mother always used it. You remember how Louis XVIII complimented her on her beautiful complexion at the first Royal ball held after the Restoration? Well, the Sovereign’s gracious words were entirely owing to the geranium blossom!”
XIV
The day after her memorable expedition to Paris opened pleasantly for Sylvia Bailey, though it was odd how dull and lifeless the Villa du Lac seemed to be without Count Paul.
But he would be back tomorrow, and in the morning of the next day they were to begin riding together.
Again and again she went over in retrospect every moment of the two hours she had spent in that great house in the Faubourg St. Germain.
How kind these two ladies had been to her, Paul’s gentle sister and his stately little fairy-like godmother! But the Duchesse’s manner had been very formal, almost solemn; and as for the other—Sylvia could still feel the dim, yet terribly searching, eyes fixed on her face, and she wondered nervously what sort of effect she had produced on the old Marquise.
Meanwhile, she felt that now was the time to see something of Anna Wolsky. The long afternoon and evening stretching before her seemed likely to be very dull, and so she wrote a little note and asked Anna if she would care for a long expedition in the Forest of Montmorency. It was the sort of thing Anna always said bored her, but as she was not going to the Casino a drive would surely be better than doing nothing.
And now Sylvia, sitting idly by her bedroom window, was awaiting Anna’s answer to her note. She had sent it, just before she went down to luncheon, by a commissionaire, to the Pension Malfait, and the answer ought to have come ere now.
After their drive she and Anna might call on the Wachners and offer to take them to the Casino; and with the thought of the Wachners there came over Sylvia a regret that the Comte de Virieu was so fastidious. He seemed to detest the Wachners! When he met them at the Casino, the most he would do was to incline his head coldly towards them. Who could wonder that Madame Wachner spoke so disagreeably of him?
Sylvia Bailey’s nature was very loyal, and now she reminded herself that this couple, for whom Count Paul seemed to have an instinctive dislike, were good-natured and kindly. She must ever remember gratefully how helpful Madame Wachner had been during the first few days she and Anna had been at Lacville, in showing them the little ways about the place, and in explaining to them all sorts of things about the Casino.
And how kindly the Wachners had pressed Anna yesterday to have supper with them during Sylvia’s absence in Paris!
There came a knock at the door, and Sylvia jumped up from her chair. No doubt this was Anna herself in response to the note.
“Come in,” she cried out, in English.
There was a pause, and another knock. Then it was not Anna?
“Entrez!”
The commissionaire by whom Sylvia had sent her note to Madame Wolsky walked into the room. To her great surprise he handed her back her own letter to her friend. The envelope had been opened, and together with her letter was a sheet of common notepaper, across which was scrawled, in pencil, the words, “Madame Wolsky est partie.”
Sylvia looked up. “Partie?” The word puzzled her. Surely it should have been “Sortie.” Perhaps Anna had gone to Paris for the day to bank her large winnings. “Then the lady was out?” she said to the man.
“The lady has left the Pension Malfait,” he said, briefly. “She has gone away.”
“There must be some mistake!” Sylvia exclaimed, in French. “My friend would never have left Lacville without telling me.”
The commissionaire went on: “But I have brought back a motor-cab as Madame directed me to do.”
She paid him, and went downstairs hurriedly. What an extraordinary mistake! It was out of the question that Anna should have left Lacville without telling her; but as the motor was there she might as well drive to the Pension Malfait and find out the meaning of the curt message, and also why her own letter to Anna had been opened.
If Anna had gone into Paris for the day, the only thing to do was to go for a drive alone. The prospect was not exhilarating, but it would be better than staying indoors, or even in the garden by herself, all
