'Not now, my darling; I am occupied. Go away for a little while.'
The women who were with them took the children back to their apartments. She sat down with the note still in her hand. What could it mean? No good thing was ever said thus. She pondered long, and was unable to imagine any sense or meaning it could have, though all the while memories thronged upon, her of words, and looks, and many trifles which had told her of the enmity that was existent between her cousin and Sabran. That she saw; but there her knowledge ceased, her vision failed. She could go no further, conjecture nothing more.
'Ask Egon!' Did they think she would ask him or any living being that which Sabran had refused to confide in her? Whoever wrote this knew her little, she thought. Perhaps there were women who would have done so. She was not one of them.
With a sudden impulse of scorn she cast the sheet of paper into the fire before her. Then she went to her writing-table and enclosed the envelope in another, which she addressed to her lawyers in Salzburg. She wrote with it: 'This is the cover to an anonymous letter which I have received. Try your uttermost to discover the sender.'
Then she sat down again and thought long, and wearily, and vainly. She could make nothing of it. She could see no more than a wayfarer whom a blank wall faces as he goes. The violets and orange blossoms were close at her elbow; she never in after time smelt their perfume without a sick memory of the stunned, stupefied bewilderment of that hour.
The door unclosed again, a voice again spoke behind as a hand drew back the folds of the tapestry.
'What, are you in darkness here? I am very cold. Have you no tea for me?' said Sabran, as he entered, his eyes brilliant; his cheeks warm, from the long gallop against the wind. He had changed his clothes, and wore a loose suit of velvet; the servants, entering behind him, lit the candelabra, and brought in the lamps; warmth, and gladness, and light seemed to come with him; she looked up and thought, 'Ah! what does any thing matter? He is home in safety!'
The impulse to ask of him what she had been bidden to ask of Egon Vàsàrhely had passed with the intense surprise of the first moment. She could not ask of him what she had promised never to seek to know; she could not reopen a long-closed wound. But neither could she forget the letter lying burnt there amongst the flames of the wood. He noticed that her usual perfect calm was broken as she welcomed him, gave him his letters, and bade the servants bring tea; but he thought it mere anxiety, and his belated drive; and being tired with a pleasant fatigue which made rest sweet, he stretched his limbs out on a low couch beside the hearth, and gave himself up to that delicious dreamy sense of bien-être which a beautiful woman, a beautiful room, tempered warmth and light, and welcome repose, bring to any man after some hours effort and exposure in wild weather and intense cold and increasing darkness.
'I almost began to think I should not see you to-night,' he said happily, as he took from her hand the little cup of Frankenthal china which sparkled like a jewel in the light. 'I had fairly lost my way, and Josef knew it no better than I; the snow fell with incredible rapidity, and it seemed to grow night in an instant. I let the horses take their road, and they brought us home; but if there be any poor pedlars or carriers on the hills to-night I fear they will go to their last sleep.'
She shuddered and looked at him with dim, fond eyes, 'He is here; he is mine,' she thought; 'what else matters?'