Lady Norgate dropped the paper, and covered her face with her hands. He had spoken truly. Her love meant life or death!
Had she believed, or troubled about the concluding paragraph of the notice, had she ventured to tell herself it was true that Gerald had forgotten her, and Carlotta was responsible for his death, her mind would soon have been set at rest.
Like a courteous foe who gives fair warning, Mlle. Carlotta wrote once more:
“He is dead. He died for your sake, not mine. Your name, not mine, was on his lips. Look to yourself. I am coming to London.”
No doubt Carlotta meant this letter as a first blow towards revenge. She would hardly have written it had she known that Lady Norgate would cherish those words forever. Poor comfort as it was, they told her that Gerald had loved her to the last.
Then Mlle. Carlotta, more beautiful, more enticing, more audacious than ever, came to London.
For some months it had been whispered in society that Sir Ralph Norgate was not so perfect a husband as such a wife as Eugenia might rightly expect. After Carlotta’s reappearance the whispers grew louder, the statements more circumstantial. Eugenia caught an echo of them and smiled disdainfully.
Then the name of Carlotta’s new victim became town-talk. Yet Eugenia made no sign.
Not even when she met her husband, in broad daylight, seated side by side with the siren. The man had the grace to turn his head away, but Carlotta shot a glance of malicious triumph at the pale lady who passed without a quiver of the lip. James Herbert was with his sister, and found this encounter too much even for his cynicism. He was bound to speak.
“The blackguard!” he said. “But Eugenia, I don’t think I would have a divorce or a separation. It makes such a scandal.”