Then began a strange defile of rag-tag humanity to the Cadogan Square door—women, men, of all nationalities and pretensions. But the evil was beyond their power. At last an American specialist, who had won renown by turning a famous woman of sixty into the semblance of a woman of six-and-thirty—for a short time—was called in. Lady Holme knew that his verdict must be final. If he could do nothing to restore her vanished loveliness nothing could be done. After being closeted with her for a long time he came out of her room. There were tears in his eyes. To the footman who opened the hall door, and who stared in surprise, he explained his emotion thus.
“Poor lady,” he said. “It’s a hopeless case.”
“Ah!” said the man, who was the pale footman Lady Holme had sent with the latch-key to Leo Ulford.
“Hopeless. It’s a hard thing to have to tell a lady she’ll always be—be—”
“What, sir?” said the footman.
“Well—what people won’t enjoy looking at.”
He winked his eyes. He was a little bald man, with a hatchet face that did not suggest emotion.
“And judging by part of the left side of the face, I guess she must have been almost a beauty once,” he added, stepping into the square.
That was Lady Holme now. She had to realise herself as a woman whom people would rather not look at.
All this time she had not seen Fritz. He had asked to see her. He had even tried to insist on seeing her, but so long as there was any hope in her of recovering her lost beauty she had refused to let him come near her. The thought of his eyes staring upon the tragic change in her face sent cold creeping through her veins. But when the American had gone she realised that there was nothing to wait for, that if she were ever to let Fritz see her again it had better be now. The bandages in which her face had been swathed had been removed. She went to a mirror and, setting her teeth and clenching her hands, looked into it steadily.