"Tell your wife not to wait for me, Bernard."
"Yes, Madame la Comtesse." Bernard backed out respectfully through the door.
"How fat he is, and what sleek hair," marvelled Cosmo. "And what a solemn manner. No wonder I did not recognize him at once. He showed me into your father's room, you know. He looks a Special Envoy's confidential man all over. And to think that he is your household spy! I wonder at your patience."
"Perhaps if I had anything to conceal I would have had less patience with the spy," she said, equably. "I believe that when we lived in Paris he wrote every week to M. de Montevesso, because, you know, he can write quite well. I wonder what he found to write about. Lists of names, I suppose. Or perhaps his own views of the people who called with bits of overheard conversations."
"It's incredible," murmured Cosmo. "It's fantastic. What contempt he must have for your husband."
"The most remarkable thing," said Madame de Montevesso, "is that I am convinced that he doesn't write any lies."
"Yes," said Cosmo, "I assume that. And do you mean that the Count is paying him every week for that sort of thing. It's an ugly farce."
"Don't you think," said the Countess, "that something serious may come of it some day?" Cosmo made a hopeless gesture.
"The man you married is mad," he said with intense conviction.
"There have been times when I felt as if I were mad myself," murmured Madame de Montevesso. "Take up your hat," she added quickly.