I am very ancient.
In my time it belonged to the Savaresse family.'
'So I have heard,' he said, 'but that was long ago. I have only had it a
few years. Fontaine my landlord bought it from them. Did you know M. le
Comte!'
'No,' I answered, 'Madame la Comtesse. She was left a widow very shortly
after her marriage. I never knew M. le Comte.'
My host shrugged his shoulders.
'From all accounts,' he said, 'you did not lose very much.'
'It was an unhappy marriage,' I remarked, vaguely, 'most unhappy. Her
second marriage promised greater felicity.'
Mr. Venables looked at me curiously.
'I understood,' he began, but he broke off abruptly. 'I did not know Madame
de Savaresse married again.'
His tone had suddenly changed, it had grown less cordial, and we parted
shortly afterwards with a certain constraint. And as I walked home
pensively curious, his interrupted sentence puzzled me. Does he look upon
me as an impostor, a vulgar gossip-monger? What has he heard, what does he
know of her? Does he know anything? I cannot help believing so. I almost
wish I had asked him definitely, but he would have misunderstood my
motives. Yet, even so, I wish I had asked him.
_6th October.
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