After a space he strode toward her home. It was a one-story, straw-thatched cottage, and as he entered the little yard he looked at once at the door and at the two little windows on either side. No one seemed around.
Albert rapped on the door. He heard a voice within. It was M. Chauraux’s voice; his voice in anger.
He rapped again.
Silence.
Albert’s heart throbbed with misgivings.
Again he knocked.
The door soon opened with a rapid movement, M. Chauraux on the threshold with a forbidding look in his round brown eyes.
Albert greeted him with his usual cordiality but with a fast-beating heart.
M. Chauraux’s eyes moved from side to side, the tuft under his lower lip projecting ominously.
“Is—is Mademoiselle Eugenia unwell?” Albert stammered.