ever again show herself by Annette's side
in the bright sunlight.

She rang, and before drinking her tea she gave orders for departure,
wrote some telegrams, even ordering her dinner for that evening
by telegraph, settled her bills in the country, gave her final
instructions, arranged everything in less than an hour, a prey to
feverish and increasing impatience.

When she went down stairs, Annette and Olivier, who had been told of her
decision, questioned her with surprise. Then, seeing that she would
not give any precise reason for this sudden departure, they grumbled a
little and expressed their dissatisfaction until they separated at the
station in Paris.

The Countess, holding out her hand to the painter, said: "Will you dine
with us to-morrow?"

"Certainly, I will come," he replied, rather sulkily. "All the same,
what you have done was not nice. We were so happy down there, all three
of us."

CHAPTER III

A DANGEROUS WARNING

As soon as the Countess was alone with her daughter in her carriage,
which was taking her back to her home, she suddenly felt tranquil
and quieted, as if she had just passed through a serious crisis. She
breathed easier, smiled at the houses, recognized with joy the look of
the city, whose details all true Parisians seem to carry in their eyes
and hearts. Each shop she passed suggested the ones beyond, on a line
along the Boulevard, and the tradesman's face so often seen behind his
show-case. She felt saved. From what? Reassured. Why? Confident. Of
what?

When the carriage stopped under the arch of the porte-cochere, she
alighted quickly and entered, as if flying, the shadow of the stairway;
then passed to the shadow of her drawing-room, then to that of her
bedroom. There she remained standing a few moments, glad to be at home,
in security, in the dim and misty daylight of Paris, which, hardly
brightening, compels one to guess as well as to see, where one may show
what he pleases and hide what he will; and the unreasoning memory of
the dazzling glare that bathed the country remained in her like an
impression of past suffering.

When she went down to dinner, her husband, who had just arrived at home,
embraced her affectionately, and said, smiling: "Ah, ha! I knew very
well that our friend Bertin would bring you back. It was very clever of
me to send him after you."

Annette responded gravely, in the peculiar tone she affected when she
said something in jest without smiling: