She opened it, took from it the papers which she considered of considerable importance to herself, sealed them up in some strong brown paper, and put the packet carefully into a dispatch box she intended to take with her.
For that night she would sleep under Colonel Clutterbuck’s roof, and on the morrow she would take her departure. Before, however, she went to bed, there was still work to be done. She told the servants, who did not yet know of the separation, that their master would not be in and that they could shut up the house and go to bed. Having thus rid herself of them, she got ready to go out, tying a very thick veil over her hat in order to conceal the white plaster on her head, which might otherwise have been remarked. The servants’ quarters were at the back of the house, so she slipped out unobserved. She took a car and went to an outlying part of the city. There she got out and walked down two or three streets, looking carefully behind her to see if she were followed.
At last she knocked at the door of a tumble-down-looking house. It was opened by a slatternly foreigner, whose face lighted up into something like a smile when she saw Mme. de Vigny. Not that she had any love for her, but her coming meant gold, and it was of the avaricious nature of this woman to do anything for money. “Is it all right?” asked Lucille, speaking French in a low tone.
“Yes, he went this morning, and if Satan himself sent his myrmidons on the quest, they would not find him. Poor boy, it will be a hardish life that he will lead in the future. Have you ever read Daudet’s ‘Jack’?”
“Tush for Daudet’s ‘Jack!’ Don’t mix up sentiment with business.”
“Business is done for the present, as far as I am concerned, only I quite understand I have to mother him in the future—mercy, what a lot of money it does cost to keep a child, even in a poor way.”
“I know all about it, the terms are arranged. Here is six months’ money in advance, as I am going away for a little. Not the slightest deviation in our compact, remember. You are in my hands, I know your past.”
The woman made a cringing movement as she pocketed the money, and gave a promise of allegiance, but a few minutes later, as Mme. de Vigny walked away, she muttered to herself:
“I know as much of you as you of me, ma belle Lucille. Which of us has the most need to be afraid of the past, I wonder?”
Mme. de Vigny adopted the same plan for returning home that she had done for coming to these purlieus. She took a car to Broadway, and from there started to walk to Colonel Clutterbuck’s house.