Florence Marsh, bending over a table, pretended to be hunting for the gloves, handkerchief, and smelling salts which she had left there, doubtless endeavoring to hide the expression of her face. As for Hautefeuille, ignorant of the under side of this society, except for the indiscretions shrewdly measured out by Corancez, knowing absolutely nothing of the relations between Marcel Verdier and the American girl, he would not have been a lover if he had not connected this outburst of the Prince with the fixed idea which possessed him. Beyond doubt the espionage had done its work. The Archduke had learned of his indiscretion. How much this indiscretion was to blame for the ferocious humor of Madame de Carlsberg's husband, the young man could not tell. What appeared to him but too certain, after he had met the terrible eyes of the Prince, was that his presence was odious to this man, and whence could arise that aversion if not from reports, alas, but too well founded.
Ah, how could he beg pardon of the loved one for having added new troubles to all her others? But the silence was broken by Madame de Chésy, who, after looking at her watch, kissed the Baroness and said:—
"I shall be late for the train. I dine at Monte Carlo to-night. But that will be all over after the carnival! Adieu, dear, dear Ely."
"And we, too, must go," said Madame Bonnacorsi, who had taken Miss Marsh's arm while Yvonne de Chésy was leaving, "I shall try to console this tall girl a little."
"But I have consoled myself," replied Florence, adding with a tone that was singularly firm: "One always succeeds in anything that one wishes, if it is wished enough. Shall we walk?" she asked of the Marquise.
"Then you will go through the garden, and I'll accompany you for a little air," said Madame Brion. And, kissing Ely, she said aloud: "Dear, I shall be back in a quarter of an hour," and added, in a whisper, "Have courage."
The door through which they passed into the garden closed. Ely de Carlsberg and Pierre Hautefeuille were at last alone. Both of them had long meditated over the words they should speak at this interview. Both had come to it with a fixed determination, which was the same; for she had decided to ask of him precisely what he had decided to offer,—his departure. But both had been confused by the unexpected scene they had witnessed.
It had moved the young woman especially in every fibre of her being; the wild spirit of revolt, which had been dormant under her growing love, rose again in her heart. Her wounded pride, soothed, almost healed by that gentle influence, suddenly reopened and bled. She felt anew the hardness of the fate which placed her, in spite of all, at the mercy of that terrible Prince, the evil genius of her youth.
As for Hautefeuille, all the legends gathered here and there about the tyranny and jealousy of the Archduke had suddenly taken shape before his eyes. That vision of the man and wife, face to face, one menacing, the other outraged, which had been so intolerable even to imagine, had been realized in an unforgetable picture during the five minutes that the Prince was in the room. That was enough to make him another man in this interview. Natures like his, pure and delicate, are liable to hesitations and indecisions which appear feeble, almost childish, so long as they are not confronted by a clear situation and a positive duty. It is enough for them to think they could be helpful to one they love in order to find in the sincerity of their devotion all the energy which they seem to lack. Pierre had felt that he could not even bear the look of Baroness Ely the moment he read in it the knowledge of his action. But now he was ready to tell her himself of this action, naturally, simply, in his irresistible and passionate desire to expiate his fault, if it were to blame for her suffering, which he had witnessed with an aching heart.
"Monsieur," she began, after that silence which precedes an explanation, and which is more painful than the explanation itself, "I have written you that we must have a conversation upon a rather serious and difficult subject. But I wish you to be assured of one thing at the start—if in the course of our conversation I have to say anything that pains you, know that it will cost me a great deal;" she repeated, "a great deal."