She rang the bell once, twice, thrice, with passionate hand, and a servant flew to answer that impatient summons.
'Show this gentlemen to his carriage,' she said, imperiously.
The gentleman who called himself Louis Asoph bowed, and retired without another word.
As the door closed upon him, Lady Maulevrier stood, with clenched hands and frowning brow, staring into vacancy. Her right arm was outstretched, as if she would have waved the intruder away. Suddenly, a strange numbness crept over that uplifted arm, and it fell to her side. From her shoulder down to her foot, that proud form grew cold and feelingless and dead, and she, who had so long carried herself as a queen among women, sank in a senseless heap upon the floor.
Lady Mary and the Fräulein had been sitting in the drawing-room all this time waiting for Lady Maulevrier to come to tea. They heard her come in from the garden; and then the footman told them that she was in the library with a stranger. Not even the muffled sound of voices penetrated the heavy velvet curtain and the thick oak door. It was only by the loud ringing of the bell and the sound of footsteps in the hall that Lady Mary knew of the guest's departure. She went to the door between the two rooms, and was surprised to find it bolted.
'Grandmamma, won't you come to tea?' she asked timidly, knocking on the oaken panel, but there was no reply.
She knocked again, and louder. Still no reply.
'Perhaps her ladyship is going to take tea in her own room,' she said, afraid to be officious.
Attendance upon her grandmother at afternoon tea had been one of Lesbia's particular duties; but Mary felt that she was an unwelcome substitute for Lesbia. She wanted to get a little nearer her grandmother's heart if she could; but she knew that her attentions were endured rather than liked.
She went into the hall, where the footman on duty was staring at the light snowflakes dancing past the window, perhaps wishing he were a snowflake himself, and enjoying himself in that white whirligig.
'Is her ladyship having tea in the morning-room?' asked Mary.
The footman gave a little start, as if awakened out of a kind of trance. The sheer vacuity of his mind might naturally slide into mesmeric sleep.