“If you see anything suspicious,” Peter said, “tap the table with your forefinger. Personally, I will admit that I have had my doubts of the Baroness, but on the whole I have come to the conclusion that they were groundless. She is not the sort of woman to take up a vendetta, especially an unprofitable one.”
“She is an exceedingly dangerous person for an impressionable man like myself,” Sogrange remarked, arranging his tie.
The butler fetched them in a very few moments and showed them into a pleasantly-furnished library, where he mixed cocktails for them from a collection of bottles upon the sideboard. He was quite friendly and inclined to be loquacious, although he spoke with a slight foreign accent. The house belonged to an English gentleman from whom the honored Count had taken it, furnished. They were two miles from a station and a mile from the village. It was a lonely part, but there were always people coming or going. With one’s work one scarcely noticed it. He was gratified that the gentlemen found his cocktails so excellent. Perhaps he might be permitted the high honor of mixing them another? It was a day, this, of deep sadness and gloom. One needed to drink something, indeed, to forget the terrible thing which had happened. The Count had been a good master, a little impatient sometimes, but kind-hearted. The news had been a shock to them all.
Then, before they had expected her, the Baroness reappeared. She wore a wonderful gray gown which seemed to be made in a single piece, a gown which fitted her tightly, and yet gave her the curious appearance of a woman walking without the burden of clothes. Sogrange, Parisian to the finger-tips, watched her with admiring approval. She laid her fingers upon his arm, although it was towards Peter that her eyes traveled.
“Will you take me in, Marquis?” she begged. “It is the only formality we will allow ourselves.”
They entered a long, low dining-room, paneled with oak, and with the family portraits of the owner of the house still left upon the wall. Dinner was served upon a round table and was laid for four. There was a profusion of silver, very beautiful glass, and a wonderful cluster of orchids. The Marquis, as he handed his hostess to her chair, glanced towards the vacant place.
“It is for my companion, an Austrian lady,” she explained. “To-night, however, I think that she will not come. She was a distant connection of Bernadine’s and she is much upset. We leave her place and see. You will sit on my other side, Baron.”
The fingers which touched Peter’s arm brushed his hand, and were withdrawn as though with reluctance. She sank into her chair with a little sigh.
“It is charming of you two, this,” she declared, softly. “You help me through this night of solitude and sadness. What I should do if I were alone, I cannot tell. You must drink with me a toast, if you will. Will you make it to our better acquaintance?”
No soup had been offered and champagne was served with the hors d’oeuvre. Peter raised his glass and looked into the eyes of the woman who was leaning so closely towards him that her soft breath fell upon his cheek. She whispered something in his ear. For a moment, perhaps, he was carried away, but for a moment only. Then Sogrange’s voice and the beat of his forefinger upon the table stiffened him into sudden alertness. They heard a motor car draw up outside.