XVIII
It was the next morning that, by exception, Newman went to see Madame de Cintré, timing his visit so as to arrive after the noonday breakfast. In the court of the hotel, before the portico, stood Madame de Bellegarde's old square heavy carriage. The servant who opened the door answered his enquiry with a slightly embarrassed and hesitating murmur, and at the same moment Mrs. Bread appeared in the background, dim-visaged as usual and wearing a large black bonnet and shawl.
"What's the matter?" he asked. "Is Madame la Comtesse at home or not?"
Mrs. Bread advanced, fixing her eyes on him; he observed that she held a sealed letter, very delicately, in her fingers. "The Countess has left a message for you, sir; she has left this." And the good woman held out the missive, which he took.
"Left it? Is she out? Is she gone away?"
"She's going away, sir; she's leaving town," said Mrs. Bread.
"Leaving town!" he exclaimed. "What in the world has happened?"
"It is not for me to say, sir." And Mrs. Bread cast her eyes to the ground. "But I thought it would come."
"What would come, pray?" Newman demanded. He had broken the seal of the letter, but he
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