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CHAPTER IV
THE ARRIVAL OF THE OTHER TWIN
The cause of that rapping at the door was this.
Cecil Buxton arrived by the train by which he had informed Miss Danvers, by letter, that he would arrive. Hastily seeing his luggage on to a cab, he drove off to the hotel. In the hall he encountered a porter.
The porter greeted him in rather a singular manner, scarcely as hotel porters are wont to greet arriving guests.
"What! Back again!" Cecil stared, as, under the circumstances, any man would stare. "This won't do, you know. I know all about it-you've been chucked. My orders is, not let you into the place again."
"My good man," said Cecil, fully believing that what he said was true, "you're drunk."
Just then a lady came down the staircase. He recognised her-recognised her well. He rushed towards her.
"Hetty!" he cried.
The lady gave a start, but not the sort of start he had reason, and good reason, to expect. She turned, she looked at him-with scornful eyes. She drew back, seeming to remove her very gown from any risk of personal contact.
"I half expected to see you at the station. Hetty, what-what's the matter?"
The lady said nothing, but she looked at him-and she walked away, her head held very high in the air.
"Now you've got to come out of this!" The porter who had followed him across the hall laid his hand upon his shoulder. Cecil swung round. And he not only swung round, but he swung the porter off, and that with a degree of vigour which possibly took that official by surprise.
"Remove your hand!" he cried.
There was a moment's pause, and during that moment's pause another lady came down the stairs. The bewildered Cecil rushed to her.
"Mrs. Danvers, has everybody gone mad? What is the matter with Hetty?" There was no mistake about it this time. The lady was so desirous that none of her garments should come into contact with Cecil that, the better to draw them away from him, she clutched her skirts with both her hands. She spoke-
"How dare you, sir, address yourself to me?" She turned to the porter with an air of command. "Desire this person to stand out of my way."
And she swept off, Cecil staring at her like a man in a dream.
"Well, sir?" Cecil turned. A decently-attired, and even gentlemanly, individual was standing at his side. "Have you returned to pay your bill?"
Cecil looked him up and down. In his appearance he noted no signs of insanity, nor of intoxication either.
"Are you the manager of this establishment?"
"You know very well that I am. Pray don't let's have any nonsense."
"Allow me to give you my card." Cecil handed him his "pasteboard." "I left Paris last night. I have been travelling all day. I arrived five minutes ago in your hotel. What is the meaning of the treatment which has been accorded me?"
The manager regarded him with a smile which scarcely came within the definition of a "courteous smile."
"You are certainly a character."
"Explain yourself."
"Surely not much explanation is required. It is only a few minutes ago since I informed you that your presence in this establishment could no longer be permitted, and now you favour me with this amazing story."
Cecil started forward. A new light came into his eyes.
"Has anyone been staying here resembling me?"
"So much resembling you that we shall be obliged if you will pay his bill, which lies, unpaid, on the cashier's desk."
Cecil gave an exclamation-not of pleasure.
"By Jove! It's Hubert! I see it all! He has been up to some of his infernal tricks with Hetty and her mother! If he has!" He turned upon the manager, "Where is he?"
The manager hesitated.
"Where is who? You are standing here. When I last saw you, you were entering a private sitting-room with two gentlemen who happened to have a particular desire for your society."
"Where is this sitting-room?"
"I will show you if you really don't know." The manager led the way-still smiling. Cecil went after him. As they moved along a corridor, into which the manager turned, they came upon a lady who was standing outside one of the sitting-rooms, and who, not to put too fine a point on it, seemed listening at the door. Her back was turned towards them as they advanced. It was only when they were quite close to her that she seemed to become conscious of their approach. When she arrived at such a state of consciousness she sprang up-she had been stooping a good deal forward before-and sprang round. She was in evening dress. A fine, tall, generously proportioned woman, with big bright eyes, and red-gold hair, she was Hubert's "oner" – "Angel." As her glance fell upon Cecil she gave a start-a most melodramatic start-so melodramatic a start that she bumped herself, quite unintentionally, but with considerable force, against the wall.
"You!" she exclaimed.
Cecil, on his part, appeared to recognise the lady.
"You!" he said-without any appearance of undue deference in his manner.
His arrival on the scene seemed to have thrown the lady into a state of really curious agitation. She stood with her back against the wall, staring at him as if he were a ghost. She positively trembled.
"How-how did you get out?" she asked-speaking in a sort of gasp.
"I was never in." Cecil turned to the manager. "It's a little complicated, but I think that I begin to understand the situation." He turned to the lady. He pointed to the sitting-room, outside which she was standing. "Who is in there?"
Angel did not answer. Leaning forward, she rapped with her knuckles against the panel of the door.
CHAPTER V
THE TWINS CONFRONT EACH OTHER
When there came that rapping at the door, Hubert started back.
"Who's that?" he cried.
The big man still retained his grasp on Hubert's shoulder. He tightened it.
"Never mind who it is. Sign that paper."
There was a voice without. "Open the door!"
Hubert slipped from the man's grasp. He sprang to his feet. He threw the pen from him on to the floor. "It's Cecil!"
The two men looked at him. He looked at them. Again there was the voice without. "Open the door!"
"It's Cecil! It's my brother! Now you will see if I lied."
In Hubert's manner there was positively something approaching an air of triumph. The associates exchanged glances. The big man addressed himself again to Hubert.
"Look here, my friend, you will sign that paper."
He moved a step forward. Hubert grasped the back of a chair.
"You touch me! By George! I'll smash you!"
The big man hesitated. Hubert seemed to have gained a sudden access of energy. He continued to address his companions in a strain which was distinctly not pacific. "You couple of cowardly curs! You get me into a room, you lock the door, you come at me, the pair of you, with a revolver and a knife, when you know that I haven't got so much as a toothpick in my pocket! Why, you miserable brutes, I'll smash you both!"
Hubert brandished the chair about his head. The big man still hesitated. The shorter gentleman addressed this inquiry to his friend, "Shall I shoot him? Shall I put six shots into his carcass-shall I?"
Hubert did not wait to hear the other's answer. He turned to the door. "Cecil! Cecil! break down the door. The brutes will murder me! Break down the door!"
These words, uttered with the full force of Hubert's lungs, seemed to create, as was not unnatural, some sensation without. Several voices were heard speaking together. There was a loud knocking at the door. Someone said, evidently not Cecil, "Open the door immediately! I am the manager of the hotel! Open at once!"
The associates looked at each other. The clamour without seemed to mean business. Hubert had slipped from their control. If they were not careful their friendly little interview might be disagreeably interrupted. The shorter man shrugged his shoulders right up to his ears.
"What is the use? You had better open the door. What is the use of playing a losing game too far?" Then, to Hubert, "With you, my friend, I will settle some other time."
"And I," chimed in the big man, playing the part of echo for once.
"I don't care that," Hubert snapped his fingers in the air, "for either, or both of you, you curs!"
The comrades still hesitated-they probably resented the alteration in the young gentleman's demeanour. But the clamour at the door continued. The big man, doubtless perceiving that the position was becoming desperate, took the key out of his pocket. He unlocked the door. As he did so, his companion's weapons disappeared into the hidden recess of his apparel. The moment the door was opened Hubert advanced.
"Cecil! so it is you. Now, gentlemen, you will be able to see if I lied. These gentlemen, Cecil, are friends of yours, not of mine. I have never seen them before to-night. You appear to have offended them. They have been endeavouring to visit your offence on me. I cannot congratulate you on your acquaintance. That little scoundrel there, who appears to be an Italian bravo, has a knife in one pocket, and a revolver in the other. He would have murdered me if you had delayed your appearance on the scene."
"Bah!" Again the little man's shoulders went up to his ears. "It was but a little game."
"And was this a little game?"
Hubert snatched up the paper, the unsigned promise of marriage, from the table on which it was lying; he held it out in front of him. The big man, in his turn, snatched it from his grasp. He tore it into minute shreds. While Hubert still was staring, a lady advanced. It was Angel.
"So, all the time you were amusing yourself at my expense. You are a charming person. Where are my thirty pounds?"
Hubert was not at all embarrassed. He twirled his moustache.
"Cecil, this lady appears to be a friend of yours. Where are her thirty pounds?"
Cecil stepped up to him. "What confounded tricks have you been up to?"
Hubert's air of injured innocence was, in its way, superb.
"Cecil, this is too much; too much! In mistake for you I have been insulted, all but murdered, and all" – he turned to the assembled company-"and all, upon my word of honour, because I was so unfortunate as to have been born a twin."
A VISION OF THE NIGHT
CHAPTER I
ASLEEP
"Charlie, do you believe in dreams?"
It was in the great hall of the Pouhon spring at Spa. The band was playing. The motley crowd which gathers in the season at Spa to drink, or not to drink, the waters, were talking, smoking, drinking coffee, something stronger, looking at the papers, or listening to the music. Among the crowd were Gerald Lovell and his friend Charles Warren. At the particular moment in which Mr. Lovell put his question, Mr. Warren was puffing rings of cigarette smoke into the air.
"Ask me," he said, with distinct irreverence, "another."
"A queer thing happened to me last night."
"If you have any malicious intention of inflicting on me a dream, young man, there'll be a row. I have an aunt who dreams. She's a dreaming sort. She's always dreaming. And she tells her dreams-such dreams! Ye Goths! At the mere mention of the word 'dreams' the nightmare figure of my aunt rises to my mind's eye. So beware."
"But I'm not sure that this was a dream. Anyhow, just listen."
"If I must!" said Mr. Warren. And he sighed.
"I dreamt that a woman kissed me!"
"If I could only dream such a thing. Some men have all the luck."
"The queer thing was, that it was so real. I dreamt that a woman came into my room. She came to my bedside. She stood looking down upon me as I slept. Suddenly she stooped and kissed me. That same instant I awoke. I felt her kiss still tingling on my lips. I could have sworn that someone had just kissed me. I sat up in bed and called out to know if anyone was there. I got up and lit the gas and searched the room. There was nothing and no one."
"It was a dream!"
"If it was, it was the most vivid dream I remember to have heard of; certainly the most vivid dream I ever dreamt. I saw the woman so distinctly, and her face, as she stooped over me, with laughter in her eyes. To begin with, it was the most beautiful face I ever saw, and hers were the most beautiful eyes. The whole thing had impressed me so intensely that I took my sketch-book and made a drawing of her then and there. I have my sketch-book in my pocket-here is the drawing."
Mr. Lovell handed his open sketch-book to his friend. It was open at a page on which was a drawing of a woman's face. When Mr. Warren's eyes fell on this drawing, he sat up in his chair with a show of sudden interest.
"Gerald! I say! You'll excuse my saying so, but I didn't think you were capable of anything so good as this. Do you know that this is the best drawing of yours I have ever seen, young man?"
"I believe it is."
"It looks to me-I don't want to flatter you; goodness knows you've conceit enough already! – but it looks to me as though it were a genuine bit of inspiration."
"Joking apart, it seems to me almost as if it were an inspiration."
"I wish an inspiration of the same kind would come to me. I'd be considerably grateful-even for a nightmare. Do you know what I should do with this? I should use it for a picture."
"I thought of doing something of the kind myself."
"Just a study of a woman's face. And you might call it-the title would be apposite-'A Vision of the Night!'"
"A good idea. I will."
And Mr. Lovell did. When he returned to his Chelsea studio, he chose a moderate-sized canvas, and he began to paint on it a woman's face-just a woman's face, and nothing more. She was looking a little downwards, as a woman might look who was about to stoop to kiss someone lying asleep in bed-say a sleeping child-and she glanced from the canvas with laughing eyes. Mr. Warren came in to look at it several times while it was progressing. When it was finished, he regarded it for some moments in silent contemplation.
"I call that," he declared, sententiously, with what he supposed, perhaps erroneously, to be a Yankee twang, "a gen-u-ine work of art. I do. The thing. Young man, if you forward that, with your compliments, or without 'em, to the President, Fellows, and Associates of the Royal Academy, I'll bet you five to one it's hung!"
His prediction was verified-it was hung. It was the first of Mr. Lovell's pictures which ever had been hung-which made the fact none the less gratifying to Mr. Lovell. It was hung very well, too, considering. And it attracted quite a considerable amount of attention in its way. It was sold on the opening day. That fact was not displeasing to Mr. Lovell.
One morning, about the middle of June, a card was brought in to Mr. Lovell, while he was working in his studio. On it was inscribed a name-Vicomte d'Humières. The card was immediately followed by its owner, a tall, slightly built gentleman; unmistakably a foreigner. He saluted Mr. Lovell with a bow which was undoubtedly Parisian.
"Mr. Gerald Lovell?"
The accent was French, but, for a Frenchman, the English was fair.
"I am Gerald Lovell."
"Ah! That is good! You are a gentleman, Mr. Lovell, whom I particularly wish to see." The stranger had been carrying his stick in one hand and his hat in the other. These he now deposited upon one chair; himself he placed upon a second-uninvited. He crossed his legs. He folded his black gloved hands in front of him. "I believe, Mr. Lovell, that we are not strangers-you and I."
Mr. Lovell glanced at the card which he still was holding.
"You are the Vicomte d'Humières?"
"I am."
"I am afraid-it is unpardonable remissness on my part; but I am afraid that, if I have ever had the pleasure of meeting you before, it is a pleasure which has escaped my memory."
"It is not that we have ever met before-no, it is not that. It is my name to which you are not a stranger."
Mr. Lovell glanced again at the card. "Your name? I am afraid, Vicomte, that I do not remember having ever heard your name before."
"Ah! Is that so?" The stranger regarded his polished boots. He spoke as if he were addressing himself to them. "Is it possible that she can have given another name? No, it is not possible. She is capable of many things. I do not believe she is capable of that." He looked up again at Mr. Lovell. "My business with you, Mr. Lovell, is of rather a peculiar kind. You will think, perhaps, that mine is rather a singular errand. I have come to ask you to acquaint me with the residence of my wife."
"With the-did you say, with the-residence of your wife?"
"That is what I said. I have come to ask you to acquaint me with the residence of my wife." The artist stared.
"But, so far as I am aware, I do not know your wife."
"That is absurd. I do not say, Mr. Lovell, that you are conscious of the absurdity. But still-it is absurd-I was not aware that you were acquainted with my wife until I learned the fact, this morning, at your Academy."
"At our Academy?"
"Precisely. Upon the walls of your Academy of Painting, Mr. Lovell."
Mr. Lovell began to wonder if his visitor was not an amiable French lunatic.
"Is that not rather a singular place in which to learn such a fact?"
"It is a singular place. It is a very singular place, indeed. But that has nothing to do with the matter. It is as I say. You have a picture, Mr. Lovell, at the Academy?"
"I have."
"It is a portrait."
"Pardon me, it is not a portrait."
"Pardon me, Mr. Lovell, in my turn; it is a portrait. As a portrait, it is a perfect portrait. It is a portrait of my wife."
"Of your wife! You are dreaming!"
"You flatter me, Mr. Lovell. Is it that you suppose I am an imbecile? Are not the features of a wife familiar to a husband? Very good. I am the husband of my wife. Your picture, Mr. Lovell, is a portrait of my wife."
"I cannot but think you have mistaken some other picture for mine. Mine is a simple study of a woman's face. It is called 'A Vision of the Night.'"
"Precisely. And 'A Vision of the Night'-is my wife."
"It is impossible!"
"Do I understand you to say, Mr. Lovell, of a thing which I say is so-that it is impossible?"
The Vicomte rose. His voice had a very significant intonation. Mr. Lovell resented it.
"I do not know, Vicomte, that I am called upon to explain to you. But, in face of your remarkable statement, I will volunteer an explanation. I saw the face, which I have painted, in a dream."
"Indeed; is that so? What sort of dream was it in which you saw my wife's face, Mr. Lovell?"
The young man flushed. The stranger's tone was distinctly offensive.
"It was in a dream which I dreamt last August, at Spa."
"Ah! This is curious. At what hotel were you stopping last August at Spa?"
"At the Hôtel de Flandre-though I don't know why you ask."
"So! We approach a point at last. Last August, my wife and I, we were at Spa. We stayed, my wife and I, at the Hôtel de Flandre. It was at the Hôtel de Flandre my wife left me. I have never seen her since. Perhaps, Mr. Gerald Lovell, you will be so good as to inform me what sort of dream it was in which you saw my wife's face, at the Hôtel de Flandre, last August, at Spa?"
Mr. Lovell hesitated. He perceived that caution was advisable. He felt that if he entered into minute particulars of his dream, there might be a misunderstanding with the Vicomte. So he temporized-or he endeavoured to.
"I have already told you that I saw the face in my picture in a dream. It is the simple fact-that I have no other explanation to offer."
"Is that so?"
"That is so."
"Very good, so far, Mr. Gerald Lovell. I thought it possible that you might have some explanation of this kind to offer. I was at the Academy with a friend. When I perceived my wife's portrait on the walls, and that it was painted by a Mr. Gerald Lovell, I said to my friend: 'I will go to this Mr. Lovell, and I will ask him, among other things, who authorized him to exhibit my wife's portrait in the absence of her husband, in a place of public resort, as if it were an advertisement.' My friend proposed to accompany me. But I said: 'No. I will go, first of all, alone. I will see what sort of explanation Mr. Gerald Lovell has to offer. If it is not a satisfactory explanation, then we will go together, you and I.' I go to seek my friend, Mr. Lovell. He is not very far away. Shortly we will return. Then I will request, of your courtesy, an explanation of that very curious dream in which you saw my wife's face at the Hôtel de Flandre. Mr. Lovell, I wish you, until then, good day."
The Vicomte withdrew, with the same extremely courteous salutation with which he had entered. The artist, left alone, looked at his visitor's card, which he still retained in his hand, with a very puzzled expression of countenance.
"If the Vicomte d'Humières returns, it strikes me there'll be a little interesting conversation."
He laid down the card. He resumed the work which had been interrupted. But the work hung fire. A painter paints, not only with his hand, but with his brain. Mr. Lovell's brain was, just then, preoccupied.
"It was a dream. And yet, as I told Warren at the time, it certainly was the most vivid dream I ever dreamt." Deserting his canvas he began to move about the room. "Supposing it wasn't a dream, and the woman was a creature of flesh and blood! Then she must have come into my room, and kissed me while I slept. I'll swear that someone kissed me. By Jove! the Vicomte won't like to be told a tale like that! As he says, a man ought to know his own wife's face when he sees it, even in a portrait. And if the picture is a portrait of his wife, then it was his wife who came into my room-and kissed me. But whatever made her do a thing like that? There's no knowing what things some women will do. I rather fancy that I ought to have made a few inquiries before I took it for granted that it was nothing but a dream. They would have been able to tell me at the hotel if the original of my dream had been staying there. As it is, unless I mind my P's and Q's, I rather fancy there'll be a row."
"Pardon! – may I enter?"
Mr. Lovell was standing with his back to the door. The inquiry, therefore, was addressed to him from behind. The voice in which it was uttered was feminine, and the accent foreign. The artist turned-and stared. For there, peeping through the partly open door, was the woman of his dream! There could not be the slightest doubt about it. Although the head was covered with the latest thing in Parisian hats, there was no mistaking, when one once had seen it-as he had seen it-that lovely face, those laughing eyes. He stared-and gaped. The lady seemed to take his silence to imply consent. She advanced into the room.
"You are Mr. Gerald Lovell?"
As she came into the room, he perceived that she was not only most divinely fair, but most divinely tall. Her figure, clad in the most recent coquetries of Paris, was the most exquisite thing in figures he had lately seen. So completely had she taken his faculties of astonishment by storm, that he could only stammer a response.
"You are the painter of my portrait?" For the life of him, he knew not what to say. "But, if you are Mr. Gerald Lovell, it is certain that you are. Besides, I see it in your face. There is genius in your eyes. Mr. Lovell, how am I to thank you for the honour you have done me?" Moving to him, she held out to him her hand. He gave her his. She retained it-or, rather, part of it-in her small palm. "If I am ever destined to attain to immortality, it is to your brush it will be owing. Monsieur, permit me to salute the master!"
Before he had an inkling of her intention, she raised his hand and touched it with her lips. He withdrew it quickly.
"Madame!"
She exhibited no signs of discomposure.
"I was at your Academy, with a friend-not half an hour ago. I beheld miles of mediocrity. Suddenly I saw-my face! my own face! glancing at me from the walls! Ah, quel plaisir! But my face-how many times more lovely! How many times more beautiful! My face-depicted by the hand of a great artist! by the brush of a poet, and a genius! – Monsieur, you have placed on me ten thousand obligations."
She gave him the most sweeping curtsey with which he ever had been favoured-and in her eyes was laughter all the time. He was recovering his presence of mind. He felt that it was time to put a stop to the lady's flow of flowery language. He was about to do so-when a question she put to him again sent half his senses flying.
"There is one thing which I wished to ask you, Monsieur. When and where did I sit to you for my portrait? I do not remember to have had the pleasure and the honour of meeting you before." The lady's laughing eyes were fixed intently on his face. "And yet, as I look at you, a sort of shadowy recollection comes to me of a previous encounter; it is very strange! Monsieur, where was it we encountered-you and I?"
"Madame!"
Seeing how evidently he was at a loss for words, she put out her hand to him as if to give him courage.
"Do not be afraid. Tell me-where was it that you saw me?"
"I saw you in a dream."
"A dream? Monsieur! To hear you speak-it is like a poem. Monsieur, where did you dream this dream in which you dreamt of me?"
"It was last year, at Spa."
"At Spa-that horrible place?"
"I did not find it a horrible place."
"No? Was it that dream which you dreamt of me which robbed it of its horror?" He did not speak. He allowed her to infer a compliment, but he did not proffer one. "But Monsieur, I was only at Spa one afternoon and a single night."
"It was that night I dreamed of you."
"You dreamed? How? Tell me about this dream."
"I dreamed that you came into my room while I was asleep in bed, and kissed me!"
She continued to look at him intently a moment longer, as if she did not realize the full meaning of his words. Then-let us do her justice! – the blood rushed to her face, her cheeks flamed fiery red. With her hands she veiled her eyes. She gave a little cry.
"Ah, mon Dieu! It was you-I remember. Quelle horreur!"
There was silence. Before she removed her hands from her eyes she turned away. She stood with her back towards him, trifling with a brush which he had placed upon the table. She spoke scarcely above a whisper.
"Monsieur, I thought you were asleep."
"I was asleep. I saw you in a dream."
"Then did-did I wake you?"
"You must have done. I woke-you must forgive my saying so-with a kiss tingling on my lips." The lady put her hands up to her eyes again. "The dream had been so vivid I could not understand it. I got up to see if anyone was in the room."
"If you had caught me!"
"There was no one. But so acutely had your face impressed itself on my imagination that I took my sketch-book, and made a drawing of it then and there. In the morning I showed this drawing to a friend. He advised me to use it for a picture I did. That picture is 'A Vision of the Night'!"
"It is the most extraordinary thing, Monsieur; you will suppose I am a very peculiar person. It is but a lame explanation I have to offer. Of that I am but too conscious. But such as it is, I entreat that you will suffer me to give it you. Monsieur, I am married" – Mr. Lovell bowed. He did not mention that he was aware of that already-"to the most capricious husband in the world-to a husband whom I love, but whom I cannot respect." Mr. Lovell thought that that was good-from her. "He is a man who is extremely difficile, Monsieur. I do not think you have a word which expresses what I would say in English. He is extremely jealous; he is enraged that his wife should use the eyes which are in her head! The very day on which we arrived at Spa we had a dreadful quarrel. I will not speak of the treatment to which I was subjected; it is enough to say that he locked the door so that I should not leave the room-he wished to make of me a prisoner. Monsieur, directly he was gone, I perceived that there were two doors to the room-the one which he had locked, and another, which I tried I found that it was open. Monsieur, when a prisoner desires to escape, he escapes by any road which offers. I was a prisoner; I desired to escape; I made use of the only road which I could find. I entered the door; I found myself in a room in which there was-how shall I say it? – in which there was a man asleep. Monsieur, it was you!"
It must be owned that at this point the lady certainly did look down.
"I was, that night, in a wicked mood. I glanced at you; I perceived that you were but a boy" – Mr. Lovell flushed: he did not consider himself a boy-"but a handsome boy." She peeped at him with malicious laughter in her eyes. "I regarded myself as your mother, or your sister, or your guardian angel. Monsieur will perceive how much I am the elder." Again, a glance of laughing malice from those bewitching eyes. "I am afraid it is too true that I approached the sleeping lips." There was silence. Then, so softly that her listener was only able to catch the words: "I pray that Monsieur will forgive me."
"There is nothing for which Madame needs forgiveness."
"Monsieur but says so to give me pleasure. But one thing Monsieur must permit me to observe: If every woman were to be rewarded, as I have been, for what I did, half the women in France would commit-a similar little indiscretion." Mr. Lovell was silent; he did not know exactly what to say. "Monsieur will permit me to regard him, from this day forward, as my friend? Mr. Gerald Lovell, permit me to introduce to you-the Vicomtesse d'Humières!"
The lady favoured him with another sweeping curtsey.
"I have already the pleasure of being acquainted with Madame's name."
"From whom did you learn it? From the people at the hotel?"
"I but learned it a few minutes before Madame herself came here."
"So! From whom?"
"I learnt it from the Vicomte d'Humières."
"The Vicomte d'Humières! My husband! Are you acquainted with him, then?"
"I can scarcely claim to be acquainted with the Vicomte. It seems, Madame, that this has been a morning of coincidences. It would appear that just before Madame perceived my little picture at the Academy, the Vicomte d'Humières perceived it too."
"Truly! But how magnificent!"
The lady clasped her hands in a little ecstacy.
"The Vicomte d'Humières did not seem to consider it magnificent. He took a distinctly contrary view."
"But that is certain!"
"He requested me to furnish him with your address. When I informed him that I was not acquainted with Madame, he desired to know who had authorized me to send your portrait to a public exhibition. I observed that I was not aware that it was the portrait of Madame, since the face in the picture was but the study of a face which I had seen in a dream."
