'Oh, Mrs. Fenwick!'
It was a little cry from Eugénie—deprecating, full of pain.
Phoebe took no notice of it. She went straight to her visitor.
'Where is my husband, please?' she said, in a strong, hoarse voice, mechanically holding out her hand, which Eugénie touched and then let drop—so full of rugged, passionate things were the face and form she looked at.
'He's coming by the afternoon train.' Eugénie threw all her will into calmness and clearness. 'He gets to Windermere before five—and he thought he might be here a little after six. He was so ill yesterday—when I found him—when I went to see him! That's what he wanted me to tell you before you saw him again—and so I came first—by the night train.'
'You went to see him—yesterday?' said Phoebe, still in the same tense way.
She had never asked her guest to sit, and she stood herself, one hand leaning heavily on the table.
'I had heard from the lawyers—the lawyers my father had recommended to Mr. Fenwick—that they had found a clue—they had discovered some traces of you in Canada—and I went to tell him.'
'Lawyers?' Phoebe raised her left hand in bewilderment. 'I don't understand.'
Eugénie came a little nearer. Hurriedly, with changing colour, she gave an account of the researches of the lawyers during the preceding seven months—interrupted in the middle by Phoebe.