The Count laughed. “Oh, I’m not here; I’m in Paris, on two weeks leave.”
“Paris!” the Duke exclaimed. “Surely, this Paris fever is the very devil; are you off to-night or in the morning?”
Bigler shot a quick glance at Mrs. Spencer, and understood.
“I’m not to Paris at all,” he said, “unless you send me.”
“He won’t do that, Monsieur le Comte,” the lady laughed; and Lotzen, who had quite missed the hidden meaning in their words, nodded in affirmance.
“Come,” he said, “your budget—out with it. I’m athirst for news.”
The Count drew out a cigar and, at Mrs. Spencer’s smile of permission, he lighted it, and began his tale. And it took time in the telling, for the Duke was constant in his questions, and a month is very long for such as he to be torn from his usual life and haunts.
And, through it all, Mrs. Spencer lay back in sinuous indolence among the cushions on the couch before the fire, one hand behind her shapely head, her eyes, languidly indifferent, upon the two men, her thoughts seemingly far away. And while he talked, Count Bigler watched her curiously, but discreetly. This was the first time he had seen the famous “Woman in Black” so closely, and her striking beauty fairly stunned him. He knew his Paris and Vienna well, but her equal was not there—no, nor elsewhere, he would swear. Truly, he had wasted his sympathy on Lotzen—he needed none of it with such a companion for his exile.
And she, unseeing, yet seeing all, read much of his thoughts; and presently, from behind her heavy lashes, she flashed a smile upon him—half challenge, half rebuke—then turned her face from him, nor shifted it until the fading daylight wrapped her in its shadow.
“There, my tale is told,” the Count ended. “I’m empty as a broken bottle—and as dry,” and he poured himself a glass of wine from the decanter on a side table.