“And you and I breakfast at Martin’s every Sunday till I am a happy bridegroom.”
The alert physician glided away to where Justine Duprez’s eyes called him, with their velvety lure.
Harold Vreeland’s face was lit up with a tender sympathy, as he knelt before the fair woman who lay in a chaise longue before her superbly sculptured fireplace. There was a surprise in store for “the knight of the ribbon blue.” His patroness’ face was stoically calm. She was no hysterical weakling!
With a perfect self-possession, she plunged at once into the “business in hand.”
“A modern mystery,” he murmured. “A sphinx of the heart,” for Elaine Willoughby, Napoleon-like, ignored her ailments, whether of a mere passing weakness or “memory’s rooted sorrow.” And at what secret cost?
“Time presses!” she said. “Follow my every word. For, I have sent them all away. There is only Doctor Alberg in the house—and Justine always keeps him in her eye.”
Vreeland breathed hard. It dawned upon him that the universally pliant French woman was in the receipt of several salaries.
“She is a smart devil,” he thought, with a glow of pride.
“I shall have to travel some, this spring—in connection with very important movements and reactions of a specialty in the stock market, which you alone will know of.
“You and I must be the only ones to handle the concealed intimacy of ours. Not even Endicott suspects.