“I beg your pardon, Mademoiselle,” said Paul. “I will listen to you very willingly.”
Henriette’s passions were no more than bubbles upon the surface of her good-humour. They burst very quickly and left no traces. The flush faded from her throat and forehead and no doubt from the painted cheeks as well, though that could not be discovered by mortal eye.
“Listen,” she said. “Your friend asked me what Marguerite Lambert was doing at the Villa Iris, and I would not answer him. Why should I? It was clear what he meant, wasn’t it? Why was she, who might really have dined at the Café de Paris three weeks ago, already here at Casablanca, so near to the end of things?” Henriette’s face grew for a moment haggard with terror, as she formulated the problem. The last stage but one of the dreadful pilgrimage of her class! She herself was making that journey, and what lay beyond and so hideously close, loomed up when she thought of it, and appalled her.
Paul interrupted her with a word of solace.
“You are making too much of his question.”
But Henriette would have none of his consolation.
“No, that is what he meant and what you meant, too?”
“I said nothing.”
“But the question was in your face. The question and a great deal of trouble. Why was Marguerite Lambert already at Casablanca?”
Paul did not contradict her again. She would not believe him if he did and he might lose the answer to the question.