I saw in her face that she had been listening--she must have followed him when he was on his way to my room. That conviction steadied me. I took his hand in mine, and stood side by side with him, waiting for her to speak first. She looked at Michael, not at me. She advanced a step or two, and addressed him in these words: "It is just possible that _you_ have some sense of decency left. Leave the room." That deliberate insult was all that I wanted to make me completely mistress of myself. I told Michael to wait a moment, and opened my writing desk. I wrote on an envelope the address in London of a faithful old servant, who had attended my mother in her last moments. I gave it to Michael. "Call there to-morrow morning," I said. "You will find me waiting for you." He looked at Lady Claudia, evidently unwilling to leave me alone with her. "Fear nothing," I said; "I am old enough to take care of myself. I have only a word to say to this lady before I leave the house." With that, I took his arm, and walked with him to the door, and said good-by almost as composedly as if we had been husband and wife already. Lady Claudia's eyes followed me as I shut the door again and crossed the room to a second door which led into my bed-chamber. She suddenly stepped up to me, just as I was entering the room, and laid her hand on my arm. "What do I see in your face?" she asked as much of herself as of me--with her eyes fixed in keen inquiry on mine. "You shall know directly," I answered. "Let me get my bonnet and cloak first." "Do you mean to leave the house?" "I do." She rang the bell. I quietly dressed myself, to go out. The servant answered the bell, as I returned to the sitting-room. "Tell your master I wish to see him instantly," said Lady Claudia. "My master has gone out, my lady." "To his club?" "I believe so, my lady." "I will send you with a letter to him. Come back when I ring again." She turned to me as the man withdrew. "Do you refuse to stay here until the General returns?" "I shall be happy to see the General, if you will inclose my address in your letter to him." Replying in those terms, I wrote the address for the second time. Lady Claudia knew perfectly well, when I gave it to her, that I was going to a respectable house kept by a woman who had nursed me when I was a child. "One last question," she said. "Am I to tell the General that it is your intention to marry your groom?" Her tone stung me into making an answer which I regretted the moment it had passed my lips. "You can put it more plainly, if you like," I said. "You can tell the General that it is my intention to marry _your_ son." She was near the door, on the point of leaving me. As I spoke, she turned with a ghastly stare of horror--felt about her with her hands as if she was groping in darkness--and dropped on the floor.