At last the expected frou-frou, and the soft footfall of the beautifully-shod feet, warned him of the Baroness’s coming.
She paused in the hall to say a gracious word here and there, and to press something of evidently unexpected value into the hands of the attendant trio, for they all curtseyed low, and said, as if awestricken, ‘Réellement, Madame la Baronne est trop bonne,’ as if their strings had been mechanically pulled, and they had been trained to speak the words in unison.
Paul dared not turn his head, but the gracious little figure paused in passing him. Madame la Baronne was richly befurred and so thickly veiled that he could discern nothing, or little, apart from the sparkling brightness of her eyes. She sprinkled her adieux around her in French to an accompaniment of thanks and curtsies, but she spoke to Paul in English.
‘I am going to Venders,’ she said, ‘and I am afraid my studies will be a little broken. In the meantime I will write to you and give you an address, and I shall be glad if you will answer me.’
She held out her hand, and Paul held it for a mere instant, no longer—he was careful of that—than the occasion would have demanded had but the merest friendly acquaintance existed between them. He dared not trust himself to speak, but he raised his hat and pressed the hand, and the pressure was returned. Then the Baroness entered the carriage, Victor cracked his whip impatiently, and the slow Flemish horses bowled away, their hoof-beats silenced by the snow. They had reached the corner, and in another instant would have been out of sight, when Paul gave an artificial start, as if he had suddenly called to mind something of importance, and dashed after the retreating carriage. He overtook it easily enough, and, laying a hand upon it, ran alongside.
‘This is not good-bye?’ he said. ‘Tell me that this is not good-bye.’
‘I hope it is not good-bye,’ she answered. ‘But go now, dear heart, I beg you; you know why I am going.’
The ‘dear heart’ thrilled him through and through.
‘You will write?’ he asked.
‘I will write to-night,’ she said, ‘but you must leave me now.’