languid eyes. The lowered blinds, the matting on
the floor, the Virginia jasmine clinging to the trellis-work outside,
produced a refreshing coolness which was enhanced by the splashing in
the river near by, and the lapping of its wavelets on the shore.

Sidonie sat down as soon as she entered the room, pushing aside her long
white skirt, which sank like a mass of snow at the foot of the divan;
and with sparkling eyes and a smile playing about her lips, bending her
little head slightly, its saucy coquettishness heightened by the bow of
ribbon on the side, she waited.

Frantz, pale as death, remained standing, looking about the room. After
a moment he began:

"I congratulate you, Madame; you understand how to make yourself
comfortable."

And in the next breath, as if he were afraid that the conversation,
beginning at such a distance, would not arrive quickly enough at the
point to which he intended to lead it, he added brutally:

"To whom do you owe this magnificence, to your lover or your husband?"

Without moving from the divan, without even raising her eyes to his, she
answered:

"To both."

He was a little disconcerted by such self-possession.

"Then you confess that that man is your lover?"

"Confess it!--yes!"

Frantz gazed at her a moment without speaking. She, too, had turned
pale, notwithstanding her calmness, and the eternal little smile no
longer quivered at the corners of her mouth.

He continued:

"Listen to me, Sidonie! My brother's name, the name he gave his wife, is
mine as well. Since Risler is so foolish, so blind as to allow the
name to be dishonored by you, it is my place to defend it against your
attacks. I beg you, therefore, to inform Monsieur Georges Fromont that
he must change mistresses as soon as possible, and go elsewhere to ruin
himself. If not--"

"If not?" queried Sidonie, who had not ceased to play with her rings
while he was speaking.

"If not, I shall tell my brother what is going on in his house, and you
will be surprised at the Risler whose acquaintance you will make
then--a man as violent and ungovernable as he usually is inoffensive. My
disclosure will kill him perhaps, but you can be sure that he will kill
you first."

She shrugged her shoulders.

"Very well! let him kill me. What do I care for that?"

This was said with such a heartbroken, despondent air that Frantz, in
spite of himself, felt a little pity for that beautiful, fortunate young
creature, who