Mrs. Foster broke into an hysterical laugh, which was very quickly followed by sobs. I had no great difficulty in persuading the landlady to find some accommodation for her, and then I retired to my own room to smoke in peace, and turn over the extraordinary meeting which had been the last incident of the day. It required very little keenness to come to the conclusion that the Fosters had obtained their information concerning Miss Ellen Martineau, where we had got ours, from Mrs. Wilkinson. Also that Mrs. Foster had lost no time in following up the clew, for she was only twenty-four hours behind me. She had looked thoroughly astonished and dismayed when she saw me there; so she had had no idea that I was on the same track. But nothing could be more convincing than this journey of hers that neither she nor Foster really believed in Olivia's death. That was as clear as day. But what explanation could I give to myself of those letters, of Olivia's above all? Was it possible that she had caused them to be written, and sent to her husband? I could not even admit such a question, without a sharp sense of disappointment in her. I saw Mrs. Foster early in the morning, somewhat as a truce-bearer may meet another on neutral ground. She was grateful to me for my interposition in her behalf the night before; and, as I knew Ellen Martineau to be safely out of the way, I was inclined to be tolerant toward her. I assured her, upon my honor, that I had failed in discovering any trace of Olivia in Noireau, and I told her all I had learned about the bankruptcy of Monsieur Perrier, and the scattering of the school. "But why should you undertake such a chase?" I asked; "if you and Foster are satisfied that Olivia is dead, why should you be running after Ellen Martineau? You show me the papers which seem to prove her death, and now I find you in this remote part of Normandy, evidently in pursuit of her. What does this mean?" "You are doing the same thing yourself," she answered. "Yes," I replied, "because I am not satisfied. But you have proved your conviction by becoming Richard Foster's second wife." "That is the very point," she said, shedding a few tears; "as soon as ever Mrs. Wilkinson described Ellen Martineau to me, when she was talking about her visitor who had come to inquire after her, in that cab which was standing at the door the last time you visited Mr. Foster--and I had no suspicion of it--I grew quite frightened lest he should ever be charged with marrying me while she was alive. So I persuaded him to let me come here and make sure of it, though the journey costs a great deal, and we have very little money to spare. We did not know what tricks Olivia might do, and it made me very miserable to think she might be still alive, and I in her place." I could not but acknowledge to myself that there was some reason in Mrs. Foster's statement of the case. "There is not the slightest chance of your finding her," I remarked.