Susanne comes into the room, saying to Helen who lies in bed, listlessly staring out of the window into the frosty morning:
Helen rises and goes toward the bath-room. Her movements are languid, spiritless. Her face indicates a sleepless night. When she takes her seat at the dressing-table, she remarks briefly:
"Make me look my best this morning. I am _particularly_ anxious this morning."
The maid works deftly, and soon Helen, perfectly equipped, opens her door. She gives a furtive glance down the hall.
Braine's room door stands open, and she gets a glimpse of Sherry brushing a dress coat within. She knows that Braine is up, and thinks he has probably gone out. She goes collectedly down the stairs, and enters the breakfast room.
Braine sits in the alcove, reading the morning papers. As she enters, he looks up and says:
"Listen to this, Helen," and he begins reading a sensational article implicating the Graysons in a scandal so thinly disguised in the telling, that the disguise serves only to emphasize what lies beneath it, as a veil often accentuates the face it pretends to conceal.
After a few words touching this affair, Braine says, as though suddenly remembering the matter:
"I was sorry to disappoint you last night, dear--"
Helen interrupts him, raising her eyebrows, and saying, curiously:
"Oh!" in a calm, indifferent tone, as though she had quite forgotten the circumstance.
"I happened to remember at the last minute that Weldon was to leave on the early train for the north, and I _had_ to see him without fail before he left, so I ran down to his hotel. We talked until three o'clock, and I knew you were so tired that you would be asleep by then."
"Oh yes, I was asleep by then. It was quite as well, I was very tired."
Her indifference is so apparent that it amounts to scant courtesy.
This piques Braine a little, and he involuntarily looks up, and says in a tone just a trifle acid:
"Had I known that it was 'just as well,' I should have had my breakfast thirty minutes ago, and been down town. Perhaps I was justified, however, in making the mistake and losing valuable time. You were last evening--somewhat--impulsive, if I remember rightly."
He is annoyed this morning. He smiles a little indulgently.