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One of our friends at Helsingfors was an old French revolutionist, who has lived a great deal in England; he was always talking about his English friends of long ago, and Jerome Otway often came in. He didn't know whether he was still alive. Oh, I must write and tell him." "We knew him at Geneva, first of all," said Mrs. Hannaford.
Piers, with his indifferent appetite, could do but scanty justice to the dainties offered him, and the sense of luxury added a strangeness to his new relations with Mrs. Hannaford and her daughter. Olga spoke of a Russian novel she had been reading in a French translation, and was anxious to know whether it represented life as Otway knew it in Russia.
He found himself trying to catch glimpses of her face at different angles, as she sat listening abstractedly to the music. When it was time to go, he took leave with reluctance. The talk had grown very pleasantly familiar. Mrs. Hannaford said she hoped they would often see him, and the hope had an echo in his own thoughts.
He wanted to save the Château Lontana from ruin, and felt superstitiously that the interest he would find in such a task might redeem him from the desolation which, like a high wall, rose between him and life. Something of this feeling Mrs. Winter had gathered from Hannaford, though he had never put it in words, and Dick knew she would be glad of to-night's news.
He came, sinking down on the sofa with a sense of relief, for he had been conscious of a weakness in the knees, as if on entering the room he had stumbled blindly against a bar of iron. "Dick and I had just got to that part, when you opened the door," Rose went on. "We are afraid you said yourself that Captain Hannaford was changed, the last time he came here."
They did not speak again until they had reached the top of the hill, turned the corner, and arrived at the steps of the Hôtel de Paris. Because Lady Dauntrey had chosen to make a late entrance on the scene, it was after midnight now, though Mary and Hannaford had come away comparatively early from the dance.
"We were most of us more or less in that condition," Dick remarked bravely. "The rest of you have a great deal left to live for, even without her," said Rose. "Captain Hannaford hadn't. But I'm thankful they're not likely, anyhow, to prove that his death was not an accident." "They don't go out of their way to prove such things here, ever," Dick mumbled.
Miss Bonnicastle broke the silence, saying they must have some tea, and calling upon Olga to help her in preparing it. For a minute or two the men were left alone. Florio, approaching Piers on tiptoe, whispered anxiously: "Miss Hannaford is in mourning?" "Her mother is dead." With a gesture of desolation, the Italian moved apart, and stood staring absently at a picture on the wall.
Her brother would bring her, and return to London in the afternoon. Olga walked to the station to meet them. Mrs. Hannaford having paid unusual attention to her dress she had long since ceased to care how she looked, save on very exceptional occasions moved impatiently, nervously, about the house and the garden.
Hannaford for an "enjoyable evening" were spoken with impressive sincerity, and the lady's expression of hope that they might meet again made his face shine. Piers accompanied him to the station. After humming to himself for a few moments, as they walked along the dark lane, Daniel slipped a hand through his brother's arm and spoke affectionately.
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