William inclined his body slightly, as if to say, “Yes, my lady.”

“And in order to give the horses proper exercise, and to relieve Matilda’s monotony, I desire you to take Matilda out driving every evening.”

Again William bowed a “Yes, my lady.”

“You understand this perfectly?”

William’s lips executed one of their rare movements.

“Perfectly, Mrs. De Peyster.”

“Very well.”

Mrs. De Peyster dismissed him with a wave of her hand, and William made the exit of a minister from his queen.

“You don’t mean—­” began Matilda, almost breathless.

“Yes, I mean that I shall go out driving nightly in your clothes,” responded Mrs. De Peyster.

“But—­but—­” gasped Matilda.

“Have no fear.  I shall, of course, be veiled, and William is the best-trained, the most incurious of servants.”

Mrs. De Peyster, looking her most majestic, stood waiting for the outburst of approval, just tribute to one who has conceived a supernally clever and flawless scheme.

“Well, now, Matilda,” she prompted, “what do you think of the whole plan?”

“Since you thought it out, I—­I—­suppose it’s all right,” stammered Matilda.

“And you, Olivetta, what do you think?”

“Me!” cried Olivetta, who for the last minute had with difficulty restrained her ecstasy.  “Paris!—­the Louvre!—­the Luxembourg!—­Versailles!” She flung her arms about Mrs. De Peyster’s neck amid a shower of hairpins.  “Oh, Caroline—­Caroline.  It’s—­it’s simply glorious!”

CHAPTER VI

BEHIND THE BLINDS

It was the next day.

Olivetta had mailed a few hurried notes to friends about her sudden departure for a complete rest in the utter seclusion of an unnamed spot in Maine—­Jack De Peyster had moved out—­the front door way and the windows had been boarded up—­the house wore the proper countenance of respectable desertion—­and up in her sitting-room, lighted only by little diamond panes in her thick shutters, sat Mrs. De Peyster reading a newspaper.  From this she gleaned that Mrs. De Peyster had sailed that morning on the Plutonia, having gone on board late the night before.  Also she learned that Mrs. De Peyster would not be back as was her custom for the Newport season, but was going to make an extended motor trip off the main-traveled roads, perhaps penetrating as far as the beautiful but rarely visited Balkan States.

Mrs. De Peyster was well satisfied as she rested at ease in her favorite chair.  It would not be too much to say that she was very proud; for hers was certainly a happy plan, a plan few intellects could have evolved.  And thus far it had worked to perfection, and there was no doubt but that it would work so to the end; for, although Olivetta, to be sure, was rather careless, the instructions given her, the arrangements made in her behalf, were so admirable and complete that any miscarriage could not possibly have Olivetta for its source.