“Yes, M. Vittequere, he is staying in the hotel,” so the handsome and voluble landlady informed her.
“With a lady?” Regina asked.
“Well,” she admitted, there was a lady, but she was not staying in the hotel; she was not Mr. Whittaker’s wife; on the contrary, she was a client, and madame had found her an excellent lodging in an adjacent house—one, in fact, belonging to the mother of madame herself. “And she is a Frenchwoman; she knows her Paris well.”
“A Frenchwoman?” Regina echoed. “And monsieur, he is risen?”
“If monsieur has risen he is but just descended from his bedchamber.”
She called to a passing waiter, and demanded to know whether M. Whittaker, numéro treize, was yet descended.
“Monsieur is at breakfast with madame,” was the man’s reply.
The Frenchwoman, who had taken in the situation at a glance, and knew from Regina’s general appearance, and perhaps especially from her sables, that this was the legitimate Madame Whittaker, frowned at the man, who, as Regina plainly saw, cast about mentally for a way of retrieving his mistake.
“Show me the way,” said Regina. “No, it is not necessary to warn monsieur; I know him extremely well. Ah, in the salle? I will go by myself.”
“Polisson—bête,” hissed the Frenchwoman in the waiter’s ear. But abuse was worse than useless, for Regina was already sailing, head up, in the direction of the dining-room. She made her entrance without being perceived. Alfred was, indeed, turned three-parts away from the door by which she had entered, and he was leaning over the table studying some papers. Knowing him so well, she perceived by his attitude that he was thoroughly engrossed by business. His companion, who wore a hat, and who was much smarter and more Parisian in appearance than when Regina saw her at the Trocadero, was steadily eating her breakfast. At last, Alfred Whittaker put the sheet he was reading down on several others like it, and patted his hand upon it as much as to say, “That is settled and done with,” upon which Regina went forward. She gently laid her hand upon her husband’s shoulder.