Then he went back to Elithe and thought how glad he was that she was there with him instead of Clarice. The salle-a-manger was nearly full when he entered it, and, taking his usual seat at the table near the centre of the room, noticed that two chairs opposite him were vacant. Remembering that the parties who had been sitting there when he went to Fontainebleau had told him they were to leave that day, he thought no more about it, and paid no attention when the waiter seated two ladies there until an exclamation from Elithe made him look up to meet the eyes of Mrs. Percy and Clarice. They had come that afternoon on the same train with Paul and Elithe, but in their second-class compartment had known nothing of the first-class passengers. They had spent a great deal of money and their funds were growing so alarmingly small that economy had become a necessity. Mrs. Percy had suggested going at once to a pension, but Clarice objected. They would be registered at the Grand and then go where they liked, if necessary. Paul would certainly write soon. There might be a letter from him now at Munroe’s, where she had told him to direct, or possibly he was on his way to her, and then farewell to second-class cars, cheap pensions and the poky little rooms au cinquiene, in one of which she found herself at the Grand Hotel. She was hot and tired and decided not to change her dress for table d’hôte.
“I don’t suppose there’s a soul here we know,” she said, as she bathed her face and brushed her hair and then started for the dining salon.
At first she paid no attention to those around her and was studying the menu when Elithe’s exclamation made her look up.
“Paul!” she exclaimed, half rising from her chair, “Paul, I am so glad.”
The sight of Elithe closed her lips and sent the blood to her face until it was scarlet with surprise and pain. It did not need Paul’s words, “My wife,—Mrs. Ralston,” to tell her the truth, and the smile with which she greeted Mrs. Ralston was pitiful in the extreme. Elithe, whom she had thought infinitely beneath her, was Paul’s wife and looking so beautiful, while she sat there dowdy and soiled and so wretched that to shriek aloud would have been a relief. But the proprieties must be maintained, and she tried to seem natural, talking a great deal and laughing a great deal, but never deceiving Paul. He knew her well, and was sorry for her. When dinner was over he asked her and her mother to go with him to their salon, but Clarice declined. She was very tired, she said, and her head was aching badly. Throwing herself upon her bed when she reached her room, she wished herself dead and wondered what chance had sent her there and how Paul could have turned from her to Elithe.
“If I had written earlier and he had received my letter in time he would have come to me,” she thought.
There was some comfort in that and in the belief that she still had power to move him. She had reason to change her mind within a few days. Yielding to Paul’s and Elithe’s solicitations, she and her mother went with them to the opera, the Bois, the Luxembourg,—to Bignon’s and St. Germain,—Paul always insisting upon paying the bills and saying: “You know you are my guests.”
Once, as they were standing alone on the Terrace at St. Germain Clarice said to him, “Paul, I must tell you how sorry I am for the course I took in your trouble. I ought to have known you were innocent. At first, I did think so, but the testimony was so strong that I could not help believing it was an accident and I wondered you did not say so. Still, I might have done differently,—might have shown you what I really felt. I was not as heartless as I seemed and I was so glad when I heard of your acquittal, and how the people lionized you. We were in Florence when the news reached us, and I was foolish enough to hope you would write to me, although I didn’t deserve it. At last I wrote to you. I suppose you never received my letter. I hope you never will, for I said some foolish things in it. If you do get it, I am sure you will tear it up unread.”
He could not tell her he had received the letter. That would have been too cruel, and he said, “I think you can trust me, Clarice. I shall always be your friend. I have no hard feelings against you. How can I have when I am so very, very happy?”
He was looking in the direction of Elithe, with an expression which told Clarice that she no longer held a place in his affection, and the pallor on her face deepened as she realized all she had lost. A few days later the Ralstons left for Switzerland and the Percys crossed the channel to England, where they were to spend a week and then sail for America. Clarice was very tired of foreign travel and her mother was glad to go home. Their house in Washington had been re-rented for a second year and the question arose as to where they should live in the interim.