In the dining-room, lit by a solitary light on the chimney-piece, Pauline saw a lady—very tall, very dark, and very cool and collected. They looked at each other for the shadow of a moment with the odd and veiled hostility that mysterious woman bestows upon her fellow-mystery.
“You’re Pauline Leicester?” the stranger said. “You don’t know who I am?”
“We’ve never met, I think,” Pauline answered.
“And you’ve never seen a photograph?”
“A photograph?” Pauline said. “No; I don’t think I’ve seen a photograph.”
“Ah, you wouldn’t have a photograph of me that’s not a good many years’ old. It was a good deal before your time.”
With her head full of the possibilities of her husband’s past, for she couldn’t tell that there mightn’t have been another, Pauline said, with her brave distinctness:
“Are you, perhaps, the person who rang up 4,259 Mayfair? If you are ...”
The stranger’s rather regal eyes opened slightly. She was leaning one arm on the chimney-piece and looking over her shoulder, but at that she turned and held out both her hands.
“Oh, my dear,” she said, “it’s perfectly true what he said. You’re the bravest woman in the world, and I’m Katya Lascarides.”