"As plainly as I see you. He told his servant to drive to the Embassy."
This audacious statement wrung a sigh of relief from the Baron; he took Madame Olivier's hand and squeezed it.
"Thank you, my good Madame Olivier. But that is not all.—Monsieur Crevel?"
"Monsieur Crevel? What can you mean, sir? I do not understand," said Madame Olivier.
"Listen to me. He is Madame Marneffe's lover——"
"Impossible, Monsieur le Baron; impossible," said she, clasping her hands.
"He is Madame Marneffe's lover," the Baron repeated very positively. "How do they manage it? I don't know; but I mean to know, and you are to find out. If you can put me on the tracks of this intrigue, your son is a notary."
"Don't you fret yourself so, Monsieur le Baron," said Madame Olivier. "Madame cares for you, and for no one but you; her maid knows that for true, and we say, between her and me, that you are the luckiest man in this world—for you know what madame is.—Just perfection!
"She gets up at ten every morning; then she breakfasts. Well and good. After that she takes an hour or so to dress; that carries her on till two; then she goes for a walk in the Tuileries in the sight of all men, and she is always in by four to be ready for you. She lives like clockwork. She keeps no secrets from her maid, and Reine keeps nothing from me, you may be sure. Reine can't if she would—along of my son, for she is very sweet upon him. So, you see, if madame had any intimacy with Monsieur Crevel, we should be bound to know it."
The Baron went upstairs again with a beaming countenance, convinced that he was the only man in the world to that shameless slut, as treacherous, but as lovely and as engaging as a siren.