"Wait," said Elmscott; "the wall of your garden hides them for the moment."
As he spoke, two figures emerged from its shelter and walked into the open. I gave a start as I saw them, and gripped Elmscott by the arm.
"Lord!" said he, "are you in so deep as that?"
The woman I knew at the first glance. The easy carriage of her head, the light grace of her walk, were qualities which I had noted and admired too often to make the ghost of a doubt possible. The man, who was gaily dressed in a scarlet coat, an instinct of jealousy told me was Hugh Marston. Their backs were towards the house, and I waited for them to turn, which they did after they had walked some hundred paces. Sure enough my suspicions were correct. The Countess was escorted by Marston, her hand was upon his arm, and the pair sauntered slowly, stopping here and there in their walk as though greatly concerned with one another.
"The pretty Countess," said he, "would be more discreet did she but know you overlooked her."
"But she does know," I returned. "She knows that I lodge in the house; she knows also that this room is mine."
"Oh!" he exclaimed, in a tone of comprehension, "she knows that!"
"Ay; and 'twas no further back than yesterday that she discovered it. I told her myself."
Elmscott remained silent for a while, watching their promenade. Again they disappeared within the shelter of the wall; again they emerged from it, and again they promenaded some hundred paces and turned.
"I thought so," he muttered; "'tis all of a piece."
"You remember the evening at the Duke's Theatre, when she caught sight of you across the pit? One might have imagined she would not have had you see her on such close terms with our friend; that she feared you might mistake her courtesy for proof of some deeper feeling."
"Well?" I asked, remembering how he had chuckled through the evening. For such in truth had been my thought, and I had drawn no small comfort from it.
"Well, she saw you long ere that; she saw you the moment she entered the box, before I pointed her out to you. For she looked straight in your direction and spoke to the Frenchwoman, nodding towards you."
"No, it is impossible!" I replied. I recollected how her hand had fallen upon mine, and the musical sound of her words--"the occasion may come, too." "There is no trace of the coquette about her. This must be a mistake."