Madam Sapphira by Edgar Saltus

The house was empty as a vacant bier, barred and bolted, unlighted, and to his repeated summons dumb. None the less, through that curious optimism which will visit even the condemned, Nevius told himself that he was but the victim of some accident, presently to be explained. He was disheartened indeed, during the trip across he had done little but prefigure the almost instant reunion, which must occur when he stood once again face to face with his wife, yet in spite of the agony of the disappointment, as he descended the steps he affected, through that duality common to certain natures, to make light of the whole thing, and wondered what had become of Michette.

"Drive to the Brevoort," he ordered.

But before the cab reached the avenue, the current of his thought had veered, and countermanding the first order, told the man to drive to the Snaiths. For it was there she must be. And, a cigarette between his lips, he threw himself back and resolutely dispossessed his mind of thought.

The cigarette done, he began on another. Before he had finished it, the carriage stopped at that corner of Madison Avenue where, years before, he had sipped the brew whose effect was potent still. Through the glass above the door came a light from the hall beyond. The windows of the drawing room, too, were lighted, and from the rooms on either side of the entrance there came also a filter of gas. Yes, she was there. And he rang the bell, not violently, but with a certain energy of his own.

"Where is Mrs. Nevius?"

The woman who had opened the door, started as at a malefactor, but immediately she recovered herself.

"I don't know, sir. Would you wish to see Mrs. Snaith?"

Nevius nodded. For the life of him he could not question the servant further. He entered a reception room and stalked to and fro, though whether for one minute or fifty, he afterward forgot. The intermediate was submerged and forever lost when Mrs. Snaith appeared. But the cabman remembered, and for the purpose of these pages that may suffice.

"Where is Hilda? " he asked, and, prompted by the teachings of an earlier education, he raised her hand to his lips.

Mrs. Snaith withdrew the hand and for a moment eyed him strabismally, then in the deprecatory manner which was peculiar to her, addressed the floor.

"We thought -- that is, we heard -- Hilda said that -- you were to remain abroad."

"Where is she? I must see her."

Mrs. Snaith fluttered her pallid hands.

"She is not well. She is not well at all. In fact, she is too ill to see you."

"Too ill to see me. What nonsense. I shall see her. Is she upstairs?"

As he spoke he turned. Mrs. Snaith made no attempt to detain him.

"Hilda is away," she remarked. "Mr. Snaith is upstairs if you care to see him, but won't the lawyers do?"

"Lawyers? What lawyers?"

Through sheer surprise Mrs. Snaith for the first time in her life looked him in the face.

"When did you get here?"