he bishop's daughter vanished
for the first time like a vanishing mist, and left her only an
irresistible woman standing alone with him in the moonlight.

The impulse that swept over him was one of sheer desire. Lena had
taught him what a woman's kisses could be, kisses such as Felicity had
never given him, such as he would now have from her as his right.
Before she could anticipate his intention, he had seized her roughly
and strained her to his breast with a violence that hurt.

"Felicity!" he cried in savage delight, "I could make you come to me
now. You are my wife--I tell you, my wife!"

She managed to free herself from his grasp, and having retreated a few
steps, she faced him, white with anger. Leigh's embrace had been
passionate, and had fired her blood with an answering emotion, but
Emmet's was an assault, arousing within her an implacable resentment.

"I am not your wife!" she cried, quivering. "Marriage or no marriage,
I am not your wife, and never will be. After what has passed between
you and that girl, how dared you kiss me--how dared you? When you came
down to me--the other morning--from her room--and found me in the
hall--did n't I see in your face--in your tears--the state of your
mind?"

In her heart she believed it probable that he had wronged Lena to the
greatest extent that a man can wrong a woman. He did not divine the
extent of her suspicions, however, and unfortunately his next words
deepened them to practical certainty.

"God help me," he groaned. "You 've told the truth. You 're not my
wife and never have been, but you 've kept her from being, poor girl.
You 've made me wrong her--perhaps kill her, for all I know."

Something of the wild and tragic strain that lies so deep in the Celtic
race now rose to the surface and transformed him. He took a step
forward and seized her by the wrist.

"I could end it all at once by dragging you with me over the cliff, and
I don't know but I will!"

Powerless in his grasp, she stood on the very edge of the rock that
fell away sheer before them to the depth of two hundred feet. He
looked down into the basin, showing here and there in the hollows a
pool mirrored in the moonlight, and shapeless masses of machinery and
stone. Whether he had really been in earnest, or had only imagined
himself to be, the vision of that cruel abyss made him pause,
shuddering. But Felicity had not taken her eyes from his face. Now he
turned to meet them, not