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The Duke de Metuan was not a riddle to her; not even a figure tinged with mystery. His wife was an unlovely invalid. Her sole value was monetary, and the duke's hints and thoughts had all to do with an arrangement wherein life should yield him the compensating delights which his family denied.
A little contrition, a confession that she had tried living without him and found it impossible, would have won his forgiveness, because his heart had been too sore to calculate. But now Len was bankrupt and Paul would be likewise. In these days Carlos de Metuan was no longer a speaker of veiled phrases.
She put it with the best nonchalance that she could assume. It did not sound like unconditional surrender. "And after that?" Carlos de Metuan lighted a cigarette. "I have leased for you a very good apartment not far from the Champs Elysées. I think you will find it comfortable." For an instant the woman's eyes hardened. "You appear to have taken matters rather much for granted, Carlos."
"But in return, you will do me a favor also? You will let me call for you tonight and will dine with me?" For a moment Loraine hesitated, then she slowly nodded her head. Carlos de Metuan arrived promptly that evening. Loraine had made her fight and regarded herself as a defeated martyr. The hour and a half before his coming she had not devoted to tears, but to beautifying herself.
Now that her brain had turned on her, forcing her to take stock of her life, many shapes and colors changed, as the light of day alters the aspect of gas and bares its deceit. The idea of meeting Carlos de Metuan brought a shiver of personal distaste. "I never knew but one real man," she told herself bitterly. "I don't even know that he was a real man. I wonder if he is still alive."
But the laughter died quickly, because, absurd as it was by all practical standards, he knew that he had let his dream become too important for abandonment without the test of renewed acquaintanceship. He resented the Duke de Metuan. He was not unfamiliar with Continental affairs and some of the nobleman's financial troubles had sought solution through his banking house.
Its writer subscribed himself with many adoring superlatives, "Thy Carlos," but that was an abbreviated signature. In Andalusia, where his estates lay, his prerogative was to sign himself Juan Carlos Matisto y Carolla, Duke de Metuan. She read the letter and let it fall from her listless fingers. Her eyes went again to the portrait in the glass. Very slowly she rose and studied herself standing.
The garçon in question noted and officially ignored that the lady, who had at first worn a preoccupied, almost troubled, expression about her dark eyes, now smiled more often, and that into the black pupils of Carlos de Metuan there came frequently a glow which was akin to ardor.
But what annoyed the young millionaire more poignantly was the thinly veiled hint that the Duke de Metuan had also sailed for America as one of her fellow-passengers.
The Duke de Metuan fancied himself genuinely in love with her. Of that she was sure, but should the Duke de Metuan learn tomorrow morning that she had overnight become penniless she broke off and laughed. And tonight had come the unwarned tumult of feeling against which she possessed no argument. Jefferson Edwardes had looked at her and his eyes were a guarantee of honesty beyond question.
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