Mlle. Claire de Beaudrillart was the younger of the two sisters who lived with their mother, her son and his wife, at the château. Both sisters were some years older than their brother, and Mlle. Claire would never again see her thirty-seventh birthday. Not so handsome as her mother, she was still a striking-looking woman, tall, thin, and carrying herself well. Like all the Beaudrillarts, she was dark; like them, too, her chin was strongly moulded, her nose straight. Once when there were tableaux at Poissy, and old dresses had been drawn from a great armoire, it might have been supposed that the very Claire of two centuries back had stepped out of her frame in the picture-gallery. She was invariably exquisitely neat even in the house, and if her temper was quick, it seldom placed her at a disadvantage. Yet, when Jean caught sight of her, he looked from side to side with helpless longing to escape, and finding it impossible, an ugly, sullen expression gathered in his face, which up to this point had only displayed embarrassment. Mlle. Claire detected the look in a moment, and stopped, him by a sign.
“Where have you been, Jean?”
She used the “you” contemptuously.
“Round the estate, mademoiselle.”
“Alone?”
He brought out M. Raoul’s name.
“You should have said so at once. And where is Monsieur Raoul?”
This was exactly the question which Jean would have been glad to answer to himself; but his face only became more stolid as he replied:
“Mademoiselle must know that he has gone down to the river.”
“To the river! With Monsieur de Beaudrillart?”