Grace turned to her husband. "Come, Richard," she said. "Let us go."
He made no reply, but followed her blindly. His spirits seemed broken, he walked like a man in a heavy sleep.
It was just dawn when, half an hour later, Richard Duvall and his wife drove silently through the ghostly streets of Brussels toward the railway station. The detective did not speak. He sat silent, plunged in a deep stupor. Grace, her heart breaking, held one of his hands, and with white face, gazed helplessly out of the window at the city, just waking to another day. To all these people the dawn came with some measure of hope, of happiness, but to her, and to her husband, now once more beginning their honeymoon, the future seemed full of bitterness and despair. She shivered in the cold morning air, and the tears she could not repress stole unheeded down her cheeks.
CHAPTER XXI
It was not until they had reached the railway station that Richard Duvall roused himself from the stupor in which he had sat ever since he and his wife had driven away from Dr. Hartmann's. When their baggage had been deposited on the platform, under the care of a solicitous porter, and the cabman had been paid and gone his way, Grace asked her husband concerning their destination. "Shall we go to Antwerp?" she said, listlessly. "We can get a steamer there, or cross to England." She awaited his reply without interest. It seemed to matter very little where they went, now.
Duvall turned to the waiting porter. "When is the next train for Paris?" he asked. The man answered at once, glancing at the clock in the waiting-room. "In forty minutes, monsieur. You will have time for rolls and coffee."
"Paris!" exclaimed Grace, in much surprise. "Why should we go to Paris, dear? I don't care about the things I left there. We can telegraph for them. Oh, Richard, I can't go back and face Monsieur Lefevre now." She looked eagerly at his face, but its expression told her nothing. "I must make my report to the Prefect," he answered. "It is my duty."
Over their simple breakfast he was uncommunicative. "Don't worry, dear," he said, once, when she had plied him with questions, attempted to change his decision by arguments. "I cannot afford to run away. Monsieur Lefevre has given me a duty to perform, and I must at least tell my story. After that, we can go to America, but not now."
She could get no more out of him, and with tears in her eyes, followed him to the compartment in the Paris train which the porter had secured for them. There were few people traveling at this early hour. They had the compartment to themselves. Duvall rolled himself in his overcoat and lay down upon one of the seats. "I am very tired, dear," he told her. "I have suffered a frightful strain. My eyes hurt so that I can scarcely see. I am sick for want of sleep. There is a hard task before me, when I get to Paris. I must have a little rest." He turned his face away from the light, and lay quiet, breathing heavily.