“Why should there be any doubt?” he asked.

“One always hopes there would be a doubt,” she said, half in a whisper.

Then he looked up, and saw all the pain on the little face.

CHAPTER XII.

THE DISAGREEABLE MAN MAKES A LOAN.

THE Dutchman was buried in the little cemetery which faced the hospital.  Marie’s tin wreath was placed on the grave.  And there the matter ended.  The Kurhaus guests recovered from their depression:  the German Baroness returned to her buoyant vulgarity, the little danseuse to her busy flirtations.  The French Marchioness, celebrated in Parisian circles for her domestic virtues, from which she was now taking a holiday, and a very considerable holiday too, gathered her nerves together again and took renewed pleasure in the society of the Russian gentleman.  The French Marchioness had already been requested to leave three other hotels in Petershof; but it was not at all probable that the proprietors of the Kurhaus would have presumed to measure Madame’s morality or immorality.  The Kurhaus committee had a benign indulgence for humanity—­ provided of course that humanity had a purse—­an indulgence which some of the English hotels would not have done badly to imitate.  There was a story afloat concerning the English quarter, that a tired little English lady, of no importance to look at, probably not rich, and probably not handsome, came to the most respectable hotel in Petershof, thinking to find there the peace and quiet which her weariness required.

But no one knew who the little lady was, whence she had come, and why.  She kept entirely to herself, and was thankful for the luxury of loneliness after some overwhelming sorrow.

One day she was requested to go.  The proprietor of the hotel was distressed, but he could not do otherwise than comply with the demands of his guests.

“It is not known who you are, Mademoiselle,” he said.  “And you are not approved of.  You English are curious people.  But what can I do?  You have a cheap room, and are a stranger to me.  The others have expensive apartments, and come year after year.  You see my position, Mademoiselle?  I am sorry.”

So the little tired lady had to go.  That was how the story went.  It was not known what became of her, but it was known that the English people in the Kurhaus tried to persuade her to come to them.  But she had lost heart, and left in distress.

This could not have happened in the Kurhaus, where all were received on equal terms, those about whom nothing was known, and those about whom too much was known.  The strange mixture and the contrasts of character afforded endless scope for observation and amusement, and Bernardine, who was daily becoming more interested in her surroundings, felt that she would have been sorry to have exchanged her present abode for the English quarter.  The amusing part