She looked at him from beneath her half-closed lashes.
Why had he asked her whether she had met anyone she knew that morning? It was not a usual question of his.
Could he know anything? Had he been present and seen the meeting?
No, that was impossible. He had been at home all the morning. She had made enquiry of Jenner as she came in, so as to satisfy herself.
Yet there was a strange suspicion in his manner, she thought. It may have been her fancy, nevertheless he seemed unduly curious, and that question of his had set her wondering.
For some moments she ate her dessert in silence.
Before her arose all the horror of that amazing meeting. The words of the criminal who was her husband rang in her ears, cruel, brutal, and relentless. He had threatened to call there at the villa, and hand her letter to Bracondale, a threat which, she knew, he would carry out if she did not appease him and bow to his will.
She was to exchange those pearls, Bracondale’s valued gift, for the silence of a blackmailer and assassin! Ah! the very thought of it drove her to desperation. Yet she was about to do it for Bracondale’s sake; for the sake of little Enid, whom she so dearly loved.
Every word the brute had uttered had burned into her brain. Her temples throbbed as though her skull must burst. But she fought against the evil and against a collapse. She put on a brave front, and when Bracondale addressed her she laughed lightly as though she had not a single care in all the world.
The meal over, she took a scarlet carnation from the silver épergne between them, broke the stem and, bending, placed it in the lapel of his coat, receiving as reward a fond, sweet kiss, old Jenner having finally left the room.