Cagliostro, at his next visit, informed Oliva that an unknown person had paid a visit to her hotel.
“What do you mean?” cried Oliva.
“A very pretty and elegant lady presented herself here, and asked the servant who inhabited this story, and wished to see you. I fear you are discovered; you must take care, the police have female spies as well as male, and I warn you, that if M. de Crosne claims you, I cannot refuse to give you up.”
Oliva was not at all frightened, she recognized the portrait of her opposite neighbor, and felt delighted at this advance, but she dissembled with the count, and said, “Oh! I am not at all frightened; no one has seen me; she could not have meant me.”
“But she said a lady in these rooms.”
“Well, I will be more careful than ever, and, besides, this house is so impenetrable.”
“Yes, without climbing the wall, which is not easy, or opening the little door with a key like mine, which I never lend, no one can come in, so I think you are safe.”
Oliva overwhelmed the count with thanks and protestations, but at six o’clock the next morning she was out in the balcony. She had not long to wait before Jeanne appeared, who, after looking cautiously up and down the street, and observing that all the doors and windows were still closed, and that everything was quiet, called across, “I wish to pay you a visit, madame; is it impossible to see you?”
“Alas, yes!” said Oliva.
“Can I send a letter?”