Page:Possession (1926).pdf/327

 when she had gone, a young and awkward girl, to the big house on Murray Hill. She had not "watched" people in quite this fashion for a long time now.

She felt herself quite a match for the wordlyworldly [sic] woman who sat, carefully, with the brilliant light at her back; she could no longer be taken at a disadvantage.

"It is strange," said Ellen, "that we have not met before."

Sabine's scarlet lips curved in a bright hard smile. "I saw you once, in the distance, at the Ritz. It was nearly four years ago. You went out before I was able to speak to you." She coughed, nervously. "So I lost trace of you. I was sorry, because I was interested to know how you had come to Paris so soon."

"I just came. There was nothing strange about it."

"But I thought there were so many difficulties."

"They happened to disappear very quickly . . . through a series of chances."

The old Sabine, the one Ellen had known so well, the Sabine who was always prying into the affairs of other people, showed itself now, yet there was a difference, impossible to define save that now her interest seemed to be more personal, more intense, not so cold and abstract.

"You see," she continued, "Mrs. Callendar found your address through Madame de Cyon."

(So Mrs. Callendar had known all along that she was in Paris.)

"I have not seen her," said Ellen, "since I left New York."

For a moment, the shadow of a mocking, bitter smile crossed Sabine's face.

"She is just the same. . . . Just as vigorous, just as determined."

"I should like to see her again. . . . Perhaps she will be interested to know that I make my début in London in June."

At this, even the indifferent mask of Sabine betrayed a flicker of surprise. "So you're still working at your music." 