Chapter 4
The same evening I took the keys and went into the house I had
known so well. Everything was in order, but the silence was
terrible. Though I went twice to the door of the marble room, I
could not force myself to enter. It was beyond my strength. I went
into the smoking-room and sat down before the spinet. A small lace
handkerchief lay on the keys, and I turned away, choking. It was
plain I could not stay, so I locked every door, every window, and
the three front and back gates, and went away. Next morning Alcide
packed my valise, and leaving him in charge of my apartments I took
the Orient express for Constantinople. During the two years that I
wandered through the East, at first, in our letters, we never
mentioned Geneviève and Boris, but gradually their names crept
