"Do it," she said, fixing me with a glance, "and you shall see how bitterly I shall punish his treachery. Now go, Mr. Denham, and meet me to-morrow evening as you have arranged."
I bowed and left the room in silence. As I passed through the door I looked back, and saw she had thrown herself on the couch, crying bitterly. The sight perplexed me.
"Does she know anything," I thought, "or does she believe Felix is really Francis? Well, when she and Rose Gernon come face to face, the truth will be revealed."
The truth was stranger than even I suspected.
CHAPTER XI.
[TRANSFORMATION.]
My interview with Olivia passed off better than I had expected. If she had ordered me out of the house, I would only have looked on it as the just punishment for what must have appeared my impertinent interference in what did not concern me. The very fact that she listened so quietly proved that she suspected Felix was masquerading as her lover. She could only be assured of this by overhearing his interview with Rose Gernon, and therefore accepted my invitation to go to the Jermyn Street rooms. If their tenant was Francis, he would resent the intrusion of Rose, but if Felix, the two confederates would doubtless talk of their guilty secret.
Thanks to a sovereign judiciously bestowed on the caretaker, I had discovered that Rose Gernon intended to visit Felix at eight o'clock. How the caretaker found out I do not know, but in some mysterious way servants seem to gain all information concerning the doings of their superiors. It sufficed for me that Rose would be in the rooms of Felix on this evening, and that Olivia would catch them in a trap. I had no pity for the guilty pair, but I was genuinely sorry for Olivia. She little knew the torture she was about to undergo. I did, and almost regretted that I had interfered in the matter. However, I consoled myself with the reflection that it was better for her to suffer a few hours' pain than lifelong misery.
That she agreed to go to Jermyn Street at that hour without a chaperon proved how desirous she was of learning the truth. Delicately nurtured, gently bred, she must have felt horrified at the risk she was running of losing her good name, but, seeing that her life's happiness depended upon knowing all, she flung etiquette to the winds and came. When I found her at the foot of the stairs at eight o'clock, I admired and respected her from the bottom of my heart.
"Am I late?" she asked, touching my hand with trembling fingers.