At last they parted. Amédée returned to Paris, and Yvonne took her little flat in the Marylebone Road. The clouds passed by and Yvonne was happy again. She had retained professionally her maiden name of Latour, and now she assumed it altogether, only changing the former “Mademoiselle” into “Madame.” Her husband faded into a vague memory. When she received news of him it was through a paragraph in the “Figaro,” announcing his death in a Paris hospital. She wore a little crape bonnet to notify to the world the fact of her widowhood, but she had no tears to shed. When friends condoled with her over her sad lot, she opened her round eyes in astonishment.
“But, my dear, I am as happy as I can possibly be,” she would say in remonstrance. And it was true. She had come through the ordeal of an unhappy marriage, pure and childlike, her heart unruffled by passion and her soul unclouded by disillusion.
There are some women born to be loved by many men, yielding, trustful, appealing irresistibly to the masculine instincts of protection and possession. Sometimes they are carried off by one successful owner and bear him children, and hear nothing of the hopeless loves that they inspire. Sometimes, like Yvonne, they are at the mercy of every gust of passion that stirs the hearts of the men around them. They are too innocent of the meaning and scope of love to bide the time when love shall take them in its grip; too weak, tender, and compassionate to harden their hearts against the sufferings of men. If they fail, the world is unsparing in condemnation. If happy circumstance shelters them, they are canonised for virtues that stop short of their logical conclusion. Wherefore we are tempted to say hard things of the world.
Fate, however, had dealt not unkindly with Yvonne. At times her path had been sadly tangled and she had sighed, as she did this night after Vandeleur’s unexpected declaration. But chance had always come to her aid and cleared her way. She trusted to it now as she fell asleep.
CHAPTER III—IN THE DEPTHS
If you step this way, the manager will see you,” said the clerk, lifting the flap of the counter.
Joyce rose from the cane-bottomed chair on which he had been sitting, and followed the clerk through the busy outer office into the private room beyond. An elderly man in gold spectacles looked up from his desk.
“What can I do for you?”