"Madame will not first rest?" (The slow comprehension of these French
maids is something exasperating.) "Madame will not await monsieur?

"Madame will not first eat, nor drink--no? Madame will not sleep?"

"No, no--quick, Ernestine. Bring me what I want. Summon a fiacre. I
shall be ready in a moment." Lady Cicely passes through a side door into
an inner room.

She is scarcely gone when Mrs. Harding enters. She is a woman about
forty-five, still very beautiful. She is dressed in deep black.

(The play is now moving very fast. You have to sit tight to follow it
all.)

She speaks to Ernestine. "Is this Mr. Harding's apartment?"

"Yes, madame."

"Is he here?" She looks about her.

"No, madame, he is gone this moment in a taxi--to the Hotel Bristol, I
heard him say."

Mrs. Harding, faltering. "Is--any one--here?"

"No, madame, no one--milady was here a moment ago. She, too, has gone
out." (This is a lie but of course the maid is a French maid.)

"Then it is true--there is some one----" She is just saying this when
the bell rings, the door opens and there enters--Sir John Trevor.

"You!" says Mrs. Harding.

"I am too late!" gasps Sir John.

She goes to him tremblingly--"After all these years," she says.

"It is a long time."

"You have not changed."

She has taken his hands and is looking into his face, and she goes on
speaking. "I have thought of you so often in all these bitter years--it
sustained me even at the worst--and I knew, John, that it was for my
sake that you had never married----"

* * * * *

Then, as she goes on talking, the audience realize with a thrill that
Mrs. Harding does not know that Sir John married two years ago, that she
has come home, as she thought, to the man who loved her, and, more than
that, they get another thrill when they realize that Lady Cicely is
learning it too. She has pushed the door half open and is standing there
unseen, listening. She wears a hat and cloak; there is a folded letter
in her hand--her eyes are wide. Mrs. Harding continues:

"And now, John, I want your help, only you can help me, you are so
strong--my Jack, I must save him." She looks about the room. Something
seems to overcome her. "Oh, John, this place--his being here like
this--it seems a judgment on us."

The audience are getting it fast now. And when Mrs. Harding speaks of
"our awful moment of folly," "the retribution of our own sins," they
grasp it and s