“Just a moment, Noel,” said Madame Claire. “May I have a word in your private ear? You won’t mind, will you, Connie?”
They went a few paces down the hall, away from the sitting room door.
“Connie wrote me about it last night,” said Madame Claire. “I received her note this morning. I had an idea you would be here, and I meant to kill two birds with one stone if possible. I suppose she’s serious about this … this marriage?”
“Oh, she means to marry him right enough,” said Noel, “and I don’t see any way of preventing it. Short of fighting a duel. Hang it all——!”
“I wonder,” interrupted Madame Claire speaking very slowly and thoughtfully, “I wonder whatever became of that little German wife of his?”
“The one he had when he ran off with Connie? Dead, I suppose. Or divorced.”
“I think neither,” she replied.
“What do you mean?”
“I had some correspondence with her at the time,” said Madame Claire, tracing a pattern on the carpet with her stick. “It was after Leonard Humphries was killed in South Africa. I wrote to her—by an odd coincidence I found out where she lived—and asked her if she would divorce Petrovitch. I have her answer here.” She touched the bag she carried. “She lived in an obscure village in South Germany, was an ardent Roman Catholic, and of course had no intention of divorcing him. She went on to say that it was also extremely unlikely that she would die, as she came of a long-lived family and enjoyed excellent health. It was really quite an amusing letter. I think the woman had character. And I think she still has.”
She looked up at him as she leaned on her stick.