'It grows late,' she said to him. 'I fear it will be a stormy night. Have you heard the Marquis return?
He told her that Sabran had not yet driven in, and ventured to add his hope that his master would not be out long; then he asked if she desired the lamps lit, and on being told she did not, withdrew, leaving the leather bag on a table close to one of the Saxe bowls of violets. There was plenty of light from the fire, and even from the windows, to read her letters by; she went first to one of the casements and looked at the night, which was growing very wild and dark. Though day still lingered, she could hear the wind go screaming down the lake, and the rush of the swollen water swirling against the terrace buttresses below. All beyond, woods, hills, mountains, were invisible under the grey mist.
'I hope he will not be late,' she thought, but she was too keen a mountaineer to be apprehensive. Sabran now knew every road and path through all the Tauern as well as she did. She returned to her seat and unlocked the leather bag; there were several newspapers, two letters for the Princess, three or four for Sabran, and one only for herself. She laid his aside for him, sent those of the Princess to her room, and opened her own. The writing of it she did not recognise; it was anonymous, and was very brief.
'If you wish to know why the Marquis de Sabran did not go to Russia, ask Egon Vàsàrhely.'
That was all: so asps are little.
She sat quite still, and felt as if a bolt had fallen on her from the leaden skies without. Vàsàrhely knew, the writer of the letter knew, and she——she—— did not know! That was her first distinct thought.
If Sabran had entered the room at that instant she would have held to him this letter, and would have said, 'I ask you, not him.' He was absent, and she sat motionless, keeping the unsigned note in her hand, and staring down on it. Then she turned and looked at the post-mark. It was 'Vienna,' A city of a million souls! What clue to the writer was there? She read it again and again, as even the wisest will read such poisonous things, as though by repeated study that mystery would be compelled to stand out clearly revealed. It did not say enough to have been the mere invention of the sender; it was not worded as an insinuation, but as a fact. For that reason it took a hold upon her mind which would at once have rejected a fouler or a darker suggestion. Although free from any baseness of suspicion there was yet that in the name of her cousin, in juxtaposition with her husband's, which could not do otherwise than startle and carry with it a corroboration of the statement made. A wave of the deep anger which had moved her on her husband's first refusal swept over her again. Her hand clenched, her eyes hashed, where she sat alone in the gathering shadows.
There came a sound at the door of the room and a small golden head came from behind the tapestry.
'May we come in?' said Bela; it was the children's hour.
She rose, and put him backward.