She took the candle from the concierge, and preceded them up stairs to a little room furnished partly as a bedroom and partly as a sitting-room. Then, when they had seated themselves and she had removed Laura's hat and jacket, she began bustling about, helpful as a Frenchwoman generally is, to prepare everything for their further stay. L'Estrange stopped her:
"A thousand thanks, ma bonne Marie: we go on to-night."
She shrugged her shoulders, a significant gesture. Marie was a very old friend, and L'Estrange had been her benefactor. She knew his weakness. "As you will, mon ami," she answered, "but this bébé wants rest," she continued in English, approaching the child and stroking her fair hair caressingly.
The bébé had been sitting in a large arm-chair, looking curiously about her. She was perfectly happy and comfortable, for her friend was with her, and Marie's benevolent face and pleasant cheerful voice had inspired her with confidence.
"I'm not at all tired, thank you," she said; "mon père carried me a long way."
The woman turned round abruptly: "This is not yours, Adolphe?"
"Pour le moment," he answered; and she did not dare to question him further, for this man, when he liked, could be repellant even to his friends. But the shadow passed. He chatted gayly with Marie upon a variety of subjects, sent a messenger to their hotel to settle their account and bring their portmanteau, and partook with Laura of coffee of Marie's making, and of such few substantials as she could get together in a hurry.
The Frenchwoman was commissioned, sorely to Laura's perplexity, to take her to the station from which they were to start for Vienna according to L'Estrange's plans. But she had full confidence in her friend, and made no demur. He went in a separate conveyance, meeting them in the waiting-room. Before he joined them he looked round searchingly. The train was on the point of starting, and the first-class passengers, penned up in expectation of the signal to take their places, were not many. L'Estrange seemed to breathe more freely as at last he sat down by Laura, and there was a light of triumph and hope in his face, which the keen-eyed Frenchwoman remarked. She kept her own counsels, but her eyes were moist as she bade them heartily farewell. Laura and her companion sped onward for another weary journey. Travelling was life to him, it had become his second nature, and the child was so tenderly cared for, so constantly amused, that she scarcely knew how long the time was.
A night and a day and another night, with only a few hours' interval—for she cared no more for rest than her companion—and at last Vienna was reached. There L'Estrange determined to rest for a few days, because he feared that in spite of all his efforts the child's health might suffer from the constant movement; besides, he had given orders that letters should be addressed to a hotel in that city. Some of these might possibly contain information which would greatly affect their further movements.
L'Estrange was beginning to be cautious, for he saw he was watched—that an effort was being made to follow him. This puzzled him considerably. He could not imagine how the search had arisen. He had thought that his letter would have explained everything to Margaret, and that with the hope before her of the child being instrumental in bringing back the father she would have acquiesced in his certainly rather wild proceedings. She knew him well enough to be aware that, heavy as his sins had been, from this sin he was free. He had never hurt a weak thing. She had known and seen how in the past his tenderness had carried him even too far sometimes, and she could not believe him so utterly changed. He had imagined that when she knew of his sudden repentance she would have been ready even to trust her treasure in his hands, in full faith that he meant well by her and by her child. And so far L'Estrange was right. If Margaret had received that strange letter, penned, as it were, with his heart's life blood, she would have been woman enough to have read its reality—she would have waited patiently, trustfully for the issue. The misfortune was that she did not receive it.