'None; she still remains perfectly tranquil and asleep; but my own experience, and two or three signs which I have observed, tell me that this sleep will soon be at an end.'
'It was in that expectation that we have hurried here,' said Martin Gurwood. 'Mr. Statham is of opinion that it would be impossible to conceal the truth from Mrs. Claxton any longer, and has accompanied me to assist in breaking the news to her.'
'Ah, exactly,' said Pauline. 'Will you and Mr. Statham be very much surprised, very much, horrified, if I venture to make a suggestion?'
'Not the least,' said Statham. 'I am sure I answer for my friend and myself when I say that we are deeply grateful for the services you have already rendered us, although the means for the end are certainly somewhat strong, and that we shall listen readily to anything you may have to propose.'
'Most certainly, yes,' assented Martin Gurwood.
'Well, then,' said Pauline, addressing herself to Statham, after a fleeting glance at Martin, 'my proposition is, that this ceremony of the breaking the news, which at such pain to yourself, as I know, you have come to perform, should be dispensed with altogether.'
'Dispensed with?' cried Statham.
'Altogether,' repeated Pauline.
'Do you mean that Mrs.--Mrs. Claxton should not be made acquainted with what has occurred?' asked Martin, in astonishment.
'With what has occurred,' said Pauline firmly, 'yes; with the circumstances under which it has occurred, no! She knows that the man whom she considered to be her husband is dead. Let her be informed that, during the unconscious state into which she fell on hearing the news, he has been buried, but for Heaven's sake, monsieur, let her be kept in ignorance of the fact that he was not her husband, and that by his cruelty she is now a woman without name or position, abandoned and outcast. Why should we cover her with shame, and blight her life, with this announcement? A quoi bon? If we do not tell it to her, there is no one else who will. She has no friends but yourselves and me. She is too innocent and ignorant of the world to ask for any papers--a will, or anything of that kind. She has already, without inquiry, accepted Mr. Gurwood's guardianship at once and unsuspectingly, and she has not the faintest dream that the man whom she loved and the position which she held were other than she believed them.'