There was a pause. Mollie sat looking with knitted brows into the fire.
"Well?" questioned Miriam, sharply.
"I stayed there a week," went on Mollie, hurriedly. "It was part of the compact, and if he was to keep his, and liberate me, I was to remain quietly as long as I had promised. But it was not so long in passing. I had the range of two or three rooms—all with carefully closed blinds, however—and I had a piano and plenty of books, and as much of Miss Sarah Grant's society as I chose. There was nothing to be got out of her, however, and I tried hard enough, goodness knows. You might as well wring a dry sponge."
"And the man you married?"
"Oh, he was there, too—off and on everyday; but he kept me as much in the dark as Sarah. He always persisted in speaking French to me—that I might fail to recognize his voice, I dare say; and he spoke it as fluently as a Frenchman. But he was really an agreeable companion, could talk about everything I liked to talk about, could play the piano to a charm, and I should have liked him immensely if he had not been my husband, and if he had not worn that odious mask. Do you know, Miriam," flashing a sudden look up, "if he had taken off that mask, and showed me the handsome face of one of my rejected suitors I did not absolutely abhor, I think I should have consented to stay with him always. He was so nice to talk to, and I liked his bold stroke for a wife—so much in the 'Dare-Devil Dick' style. But I would have been torn to pieces before I'd have dropped a hint to that effect."
"If it had been Doctor Oleander, would you have consented to stay with him as his wife?"
"Doctor Oleander? No. Didn't I say if it were some one I did not absolutely abhor? I absolutely and utterly and altogether abhor and detest Doctor Oleander!"
"What is that? Some one is listening."
Miriam had started in alarm to her feet; Mollie rose up also, and stood hearkening. There had been a suppressed sound, like a convulsive sneeze, outside the door. Mollie flung it wide in an instant. The hall lamp poured down its subdued light all along the stately corridor, on pictures and statues and cabinets, but no living thing was visible.
"There is no one," said Mollie. "It was cats or rats, or the rising wind. Every one in the house is asleep."