The two young
women clasped hands; then May bent forward and
kissed her cousin.
"Certainly our hostess is much the handsomer of the
two," Archer heard Reggie Chivers say in an undertone
to young Mrs. Newland; and he remembered Beaufort's
coarse sneer at May's ineffectual beauty.
A moment later he was in the hall, putting Madame
Olenska's cloak about her shoulders.
Through all his confusion of mind he had held fast
to the resolve to say nothing that might startle or
disturb her. Convinced that no power could now turn
him from his purpose he had found strength to let
events shape themselves as they would. But as he
followed Madame Olenska into the hall he thought with a
sudden hunger of being for a moment alone with her at
the door of her carriage.
"Is your carriage here?" he asked; and at that
moment Mrs. van der Luyden, who was being majestically
inserted into her sables, said gently: "We are driving
dear Ellen home."
Archer's heart gave a jerk, and Madame Olenska,
clasping her cloak and fan with one hand, held out the
other to him. "Good-bye," she said.
"Good-bye--but I shall see you soon in Paris," he
answered aloud--it seemed to him that he had shouted
it.
"Oh," she murmured, "if you and May could
come--!"
Mr. van der Luyden advanced to give her his arm,
and Archer turned to Mrs. van der Luyden. For a
moment, in the billowy darkness inside the big landau,
he caught the dim oval of a face, eyes shining steadily--
and she was gone.
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