"
Madame Landoire shrugged her shoulders. "As if you were ever
alone," she growled. "I wish to put an end to this."
"Step into my room then, and we will put an end to it, and at
once."
This opportunity to escape from Madame de Fondege must not be
allowed to pass; so Marguerite asked permission to withdraw,
declaring, what was really the truth, that she felt completely
tired out. After receiving a maternal kiss from her hostess,
accompanied by a "sleep well, my dear child," she retired to her
own room. Thanks to Madame Leon's absence, she found herself
alone, and, drawing a blotting-pad from one of her trunks, she
hastily wrote a note to M. Isidore Fortunat, telling him that she
would call upon him on the following Tuesday. "I must be very
awkward," she thought, "if to-morrow, on going to mass, I can't
find an opportunity to throw this note into a letter-box without
being observed."
It was fortunate that she had lost no time, for her writing-case
was scarcely in its place again before Madame Leon entered,
evidently out of sorts. "Well," asked Marguerite, "did you see
your friends?"
"Don't speak of it, my dear young lady; they were all of them away
from home--they had gone to the play."
"Ah?"
"So I shall go again early to-morrow morning; you must realize how
important it is."
"Yes, I understand."
But Madame Leon, who was usually so loquacious, did not seem to be
in a talkative mood that evening, and, after kissing her dear
young lady, she went into her own room.
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