But sleep would not come to the heavy lids, for all she tried to deceive Janetta by lying as still as a mouse, with her cheek in the hollow of her little hand.
Strange tears crept under the black-fringed lashes and dampened the pillow. The maid caught a stifled sob.
“Ah, madame, it is bad dreams you’re having!” she murmured, stroking the dark head gently.
“Yes, yes, bad dreams, Janetta.”
“And no wonder, with the noise and confusion going on down-stairs, tramping like horses the last ten minutes. I can’t imagine what all the racket means, and if you don’t object, madame, I’ll go down and ask the clerk to have the noise stopped, so you may sleep better.”
“You may go.”
When Janetta was gone, she sat up in bed, throwing her jeweled hands wildly about crying:
“How I deceived that kind, faithful creature! I have not slept a moment. I have been too wretched. There is too great a weight on my heart—the whole weight of cruel years piled into one wild agony to-night! Oh, death were better than this pain!”
Janetta was gone fully fifteen minutes before she returned, pale, and tearfully excited, wringing her hands.
“Oh, madame, you are still awake! Then thank God for the lucky inspiration that came to you at Charlottesville to leave the train! It was surely Heaven that prompted you, for else we might now both be dead!”