"Well, you are quick!" said Gwendolen; "have we become mere transparencies, or do your wits acquire a preternatural alertness in these big rooms? Yes, there is something wrong—not fatally so, only a menace."
"We felt it our duty, Yuki—" began Mrs. Todd, on her lowest register.
"Now, mother," Gwendolen interrupted, "you promised faithfully to let me tell Yuki in my own way. You sound as if you hooted from a cave. It isn't anything horrid, darling!" This last speech was directly to the princess. "Don't begin to fade away. It is simply that Pierre, who has been ill at the German hospital in Yokohama, escaped this morning, in delirium, and the authorities are after him."
"In delirium—raving in delirium—the poor tortured boy!" echoed Mrs. Todd's sepulchral tones.
"Oh, is that all?" breathed Yuki. Her face showed unmistakable relief. Gwendolen stared at her, incredulous.
Mrs. Todd put up her lorgnette. "All! Did I understand you to say all? Is it not enough? Have you known before to-day of his terrible illness?"
"No, indeed, I have not, dear Mrs. Todd. And by 'all' I did not mean the heartlessness, as you think. I only meant—I meant—"
"Humph!" said the matron, suspicion deepening with the sight of the young wife's confusion. "Perhaps Pierre has been here already. Has he been here, Yuki?"
Yuki looked more embarrassed than ever. She hesitated the fraction of an instant. Gwendolen's eyes sent out one hazel gleam. "No, dear Mrs. Todd," answered Yuki; "Monsieur has not set foot in this house since my first reception, many weeks ago."
"Humph!" said Mrs. Todd again, and closed her lorgnette with a disappointed snap. "Well, there's time for him yet! You had better look out, for if he is found here—" She shut her lips with a snap like the lorgnette-case. Because of avowed sympathy with Pierre, the good lady had assumed an air of displeasure with Yuki which all the new rank and wealth could not overcome. Yuki, strange to say, liked her the better for it. She hugged the memory of Mrs. Todd's cool looks as a fanatic might have hugged his haircloth shirt.