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"I wish to say something to you, and I am now going to speak as frankly as if you were my sister. You are wrong to waste a moment of your time in regretting Madame Wolsky. She is an unhappy woman, held tightly in the paws of the tiger Play. That is the truth, my friend! It is a pity you ever met her, and I am glad she went away without doing you any further mischief.
And, as Sylvia made no answer, "Perhaps it would be well not to say too much concerning Madame Wolsky having left like this. She might come back any moment, and then she would not like it if there had been a fuss made about it! If I were you I would tell nobody I repeat emphatically nobody." Madame Wachner stared significantly at Sylvia.
Sylvia reminded herself that the Wachners must surely have a good deal of money in the house if they gambled as much as Anna Wolsky said they did. Her hostess could not keep it all in the little bag which she always carried hung on her wrist. And then, as if Madame Wachner had seen straight into her mind, the old woman said significantly. "As to our money, I will show you where we keep it.
She walked slowly round each gambling table, keeping well outside the various circles of people sitting and standing there. Strange to say Anna Wolsky was not among them. Of that fact Sylvia soon became quite sure. At last a servant in livery came up to her. "Does Madame want a seat?" he asked officiously. "If so, I can procure Madame a seat in a very few moments."
There came a knock at the door, and Sylvia jumped up from her chair. No doubt this was Anna herself in response to the note. "Come in," she cried out, in English. There was a pause, and another knock. Then it was not Anna? "Entrez!" The commissionaire by whom Sylvia had sent her note to Madame Wolsky walked into the room. To her great surprise he handed her back her own letter to her friend.
"Anna Wolsky has left Lacville!" "Left Lacville?" Count Paul repeated, in almost as incredulous a tone as that in which Sylvia herself had said the words when the news had been first brought her. "Have you and she quarrelled, Mrs. Bailey? You permit?" He waited till she looked up and said listlessly, "Yes, please do," before lighting his cigarette. "Quarrelled? Oh, no!
These thoughts rushed through the active brain of M. Girard with amazing quickness. "Many people go to Lacville in order to play baccarat," he said lightly. And then Sylvia knew why Anna Wolsky had gone to Lacville. "But apart from the play, Lacville is a little paradise, Madame," he went on enthusiastically. "It is a beauteous spot, just like a scene in an opera.
She lowered her voice a little, but Chester heard her next words very clearly. "It is not a proper place for our pretty friend, but ah! she loves play now! The Polish lady, Madame Wolsky, was also a great lover of baccarat; but now she 'as gone away. And so, when Mrs. Bailey come 'ere, like this, at night, my 'usband and I we are what you English people call old-fashioned folk we come, too.
She took up the newest-looking of the red note-books, and as she opened it she suddenly felt, and for the third time, that there was a living presence close to her and this time that it was that of Anna Wolsky!
Chester had not approved of her going to Paris by herself, and he would certainly have shaken his head had he known of yesterday's visit to Madame Cagliostra. And then Sylvia Bailey began to think of her new friend: of Anna Wolsky. She was sorry, very sorry, that they were going to part so soon. If only Anna would consent to come on with her to Switzerland!
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