"Then I will no longer trouble you, madam," he said, holding back the curtain, while he bowed himself through the entrance.
Olympia watched the crimson curtains close over him, standing, with some effort at self-control, in the middle of the room. Then she broke into a fresh paroxysm, shattered a few more ornaments by way of appeasing her appetite for destruction, and plunged down among her cushions in a fit of shrieking hysterics that brought the whole household around her.
A knock at the door—another visitor—brought Olympia out of her fit, and turned her general rage into spite.
"Show them in—show everybody in! If they want to see how I bear it, let the whole world come!" she cried, spreading her hands abroad.
The man who went to the door obeyed her, and brought in an old woman, whose anxious, tired face might have won sympathy from a stone. She entered that glittering room without excitement or any appearance of curiosity, and when Olympia, in coarse and spiteful irony, bade her sit down in one of the easy-chairs, she took it quietly.
"There is a young lady staying with you, madam, that I wish to see. I think she is known by the name of Brown."
"Brown? Brown? There is no such person here. How dare you come troubling me about her, the ingrate, the asp, the—the—"
"It may be that the young lady may still be called Yates. She bore that name once."
"Yates? Brown? Brown? Yates? I know nothing about them. Don't go on in that fashion, questioning; for I won't hear it! Who are you that dares come here with such names? I do not keep a lodging-house. I am Olympia!"
"But there was a young lady here—the one I wish to see," said the old woman, with calm persistence.