I imagined, after achieving this piece of audacity, that I was
perfectly calm, but within me there must have raged such a tumult of
love and dark foreboding that in reality I could scarcely have known
what I was about.
Rosa's eyes fixed themselves upon me, but I sustained that gaze. She
stretched forth a hand as if to take the packet.
"You shall decide," I said. "Am I to open it, or am I not to open it?"
"Open it," she whispered. "He will forgive us."
I began to break the seal.
"No, no!" she screamed, standing up again with clenched hands. "I was
wrong. Leave it, for God's sake! I could not bear to know the truth."
I, too, sprang up, electrified by that terrible outburst. Grasping
tight the envelope, I walked to and fro in the room, stamping on the
carpet, and wondering all the time (in one part of my brain) why I
should be making such a noise with my feet. At length I faced her. She
had not moved. She stood like a statue, her black tea-gown falling
about her, and her two hands under her white drawn face.
"It shall be as you wish," I said. "I won't open it."
And I put the envelope back into my pocket.
We both sat down.
"Let us have some tea, eh?" said Rosa. She had resumed her
self-control more quickly than I could. I was unable to answer her
matter-of-fact remark. She rang the bell, and the maid entered with
tea. The girl's features struck me; they showed both wit and cunning.
"What splendid tea!" I said, when the refection was in progress. We
had both found it convenient to shelter our feelings behind small
talk. "I'd no idea you could get tea like this in Bruges."
"You can't," Rosa smiled. "I never travel without my own brand. It is
one of Yvette's special cares not to forget it."
"Your maid?"
"Yes."
"She seems not quite the ordinary maid," I ventured.
"Yvette? No! I should think not. She has served half the sopranos in
Europe--she won't go to contraltos. I possess her because I outbid all
rivals for her services. As a hairdresser she is unequalled. And it's
so much nicer not being forced to call in a coiffeur in every town! It
was she who invented my 'Elsa' coiffure. Perhaps you remember it?"
"Perfectly. By the way, when do you recommence your engagements?"
She smiled nervously. "I--I haven't decided."
Nothing with any particle of significance passed during the remainder
of our interview. Telling her that I was leaving for England the next
day, I bade good-by to Rosa. She did not express the hope of seeing me
again, and for some obscure reason, buried in the mysteries of love's
psychology, I dared not express the hope to her. And so we parted,
with a thousand things unsaid, on a note of ineffectuality, of
suspense, of vague indefiniteness.