She had decided in the train that her methods with all who opposed her must be as they used to be with Sister Jeanne—a statement of her intentions, and then silence and no explanations. Sister Jeanne had given up all argument with her in her last year at the convent!
Mr. Parsons soon found that his words were falling upon deaf ears, and were perfectly useless. She had cut herself adrift from her aunt and uncle, whom she cordially disliked, leaving them a letter to tell them that as she was now her own mistress, she never meant to trouble them or Mr. Greenbank again, and she bid them adieu!
"It is not as if they had ever been the least kind to me," she did condescend to inform the lawyer. "They couldn't bear me really—Samuel, although he was such a poor creature, was far the best of them. Uncle was only wanting my money for him, and Aunt Jemima detested me, and only had me with her because Papa left in his will that she had to, or lose his legacy. You can't think what I've learned of their meannesses in the month I've know them!"
Thus Mr. Parsons had no further arguments to use—and felt that after seeing her safe to his own hotel that night, and helping to engage a suitable and responsible maid next day to travel with her, he could do no more.
The question of the name troubled him most, and he almost refused to agree that she should be known as Mrs. Howard.
"But I have told Mr. Arranstoun that I mean to be only that!" Sabine exclaimed, "and he didn't mind, and"—here her violet eyes flashed—"I will not be anything else—so there!"
Mr. Parsons shrugged his shoulders; she was impossible to deal with, and as he himself was obliged to return to America in the following week, he felt the only thing to do was to let her have her way. And so well did he guard his client's secret then and afterwards, that even Simone, though a shrewd Frenchwoman, had never known that her mistress' name was not really Howard. At the time of her being engaged she was just leaving an American lady from the far West whom Mr. Parsons knew of, and she was delighted to come as maid and almost chaperon to this sweet, but wilful young lady.
So they had gone to Paris together, to order clothes—such a joyous task—and to make herself forget those hours so terribly full of strange emotion was all which occupied Sabine's mind at this period. Other preoccupations came later; and it was then that she listened to Simone's suggestion of going to San Francisco. The maid knew it well, and there they spent several months in a quiet hotel. But they neither of them cared much to remember those days, and nothing would have ever induced Sabine to return thither.
She thought of these things now, as Simone left the room with the blue case, but she put from her all disturbing remembrances on her journey to Paris, and rushed into Moravia's arms, who was waiting for her in her palatial apartment in the Avenue du Bois; they really loved one another, these two women, as few sisters do.