A little while ago I had been ready to seize upon almost any expedient
for keeping Raoul away from my house to-night, but now, after what I had
just heard from Godensky, I prayed to see him waiting for me.
Nobody (except Ivor, concerning whom I'd given orders) would be let in
so late at night, during my absence, not even Raoul himself; so if he
had come to reproach me, or break with me, he would have to stand
outside the locked gate till I appeared. I looked for him longingly, but
he was not there. There was, to be sure, a motor brougham in the street,
for a wonder (usually the Rue d'Hollande is as empty as a desert, after
eleven o'clock), but a girl's face peered out at me from the window--an
impish, curiously abnormal little face it was--extinguishing the spark
of hope that sprang to life as I caught sight of the carriage.
It was standing before the closed gate of a house almost opposite mine,
and the girl seemed somewhat interested in me; but I was not at all
interested in her, and I hate being stared at as if I were something in
a museum.
The gate is always kept locked at night, when I'm at the theatre; but
Marianne has the key, and we let ourselves in when we come, for only old
Henri sits up, and he is growing a little deaf.
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