"Alone?"
"No, miss; Count Gustav is with her. He has been here about a quarter of an hour."
I went straight to the salon. Madame was sitting on a lounge, her face full of trouble, and Count Gustav was pacing up and down the room speaking energetically with many forceful gestures. He stopped and frowned at the interruption; but his frown changed to a smile as he held out his hand.
He opened with what, as a chess player, I may call the lie gambit.
"I have been endeavouring to cheer up Madame d'Artelle, Miss Gilmore," he said lightly. "I tell her she takes the postponement—or if you like, the abandonment—of the marriage with Karl too seriously."
"Is it abandoned?" I asked.
"Did she not tell you?"
"Yes; but I could scarcely believe it, seeing how much you have counted upon the marriage. The abandonment is a tribute to your influence. But why have you given it up?"
"I given it up? I? What can it be to me?" he laughed. "It is not my marriage, Miss Gilmore. I like my brother, of course, but I am not in love with him so much as to want to marry him."
"All Pesth knows how much you love your brother," said I, drily.