"Which cousin, I wonder? Was he married?"
"He had been, I believe, but his wife was dead. She had treated him shamefully, I heard, and finally ran away. I never quite found out, you know; these things are sometimes hard to discover, aren't they? One day we may meet again; like all my dear husband's friends, he has a standing invitation to the Château. Poor Monsieur Traies, I wonder what has become of him."
I could not hide my extreme emotion, and for a second my brain was too numb to invent a pretext.
"Oh Madame," I cried faintly, "I feel ill all of a sudden," and I rushed from the room, and upstairs to my bedroom.
He was in France. I might meet him in this very house. It was not the coincidence which affected me, but the suddenness with which an old vision had become a near possibility. Nature and habit were stronger than last night's Resolution, and pacing about my room I rehearsed in hectic detail all the mad alternative ways in which the meeting would take place, the long-planned dénouement be achieved.
By luncheon I had calmed down and could pass the sudden sickness off as a turn I often had when tired.
"Fatigues of the journey," sympathized the Countess.
Next day I began my duties. The program was an hour or two's Conversation with Suzanne, followed by Reading with Elise. From the first day the former was nothing more (or less) than a chat, sometimes slanderous, mostly frivolous, always friendly: developing my golden talent for tattle, and in the idlest and surest fashion perfecting Suzanne's English. We became the best of companions.
Elise began by giving me a fright. "I love your poets," she said in her precise plaintive English, "Shakespeare best of all, though" (proudly) "very few French people do. We will read his plays together. I have read most of them, but you will know them far better. I should like to begin with either Macbeth or Othello, my two favourites. Which do you advise?"
I had never heard of either.