wish." She stretched out her hands as if she would shake me in her exasperation. Then she laughed, a little wildly, and went back to her seat on the couch. "What was in my thoughts then?" "At the foundation--the inconvenience of your religious convictions as a member of the Roman Catholic Church." "You are mad," she cried, with a toss of her shapely head and a ringing laugh. But as the laugh died away her eyes filled with sobering perplexity. "At the foundation," she said slowly, repeating my words. "You are a poor thought-reader. What else was I thinking of?" I paused to give due significance to my next words, and looked at her fixedly as I spoke. "Of your marriage with M. Constans; and that in your church, marriage is a sacrament." "You are a devil," she exclaimed, with fresh excitement, almost with fury indeed. "Say what you mean and don't torment me." "The Count has been urging you to marry him of course, and----" "You have been listening. You spy." The last vestige of her self-control was lost as she flung the words at me. I paused. I never act impetuously with hysterical people. With studied deliberation I closed my book, having carefully laid a marker between the pages, and looked round as if for anything that might belong to me. Then I rose. Her eyes watched me with growing doubt and anxiety. "I shall be ready to leave the house in about an hour, Madame," I said icily, and walked toward the door. She let me get close to it. "What are you going to do?" My answer was a cold smile, in which I contrived to convey a threat. I knew how to frighten her. She jumped up and rushed to the door and stood with her back against it--as an angry, over-teased child will do. "You shall not go. You mean to try and ruin me." I had known before that she was afraid of me; but she had never shown it so openly. "Yes, I shall do my best." I spoke so calmly and looked her so firmly in the face that she was convinced of my earnestness. "I didn't mean what I said," she declared. "It is too late for that," I replied,
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