"I will send for you presently, Lucille," she said. Then when the door had closed she held out her hands to the Count. "I have been expecting you."
Felix bent over her hand for a moment.
"I come to you with all my joys and sorrows," he said, "with all my ambitions, my successes, and my failures."
"Yes; and I am glad. You know that, Felix," she answered. "To-day you touch your ambition."
"You have heard the news then? I sometimes wonder how news, bad news, can come into this sweet retreat."
"Bad news, Felix?"
"Is it not bad, since Maurice is dead?"
The woman looked at him for a moment, and then turned away.
"Why attempt to deceive me?" she said.