lash with
rage.

"We had a meeting. It was for that purpose that I left for two hours
this morning. You don't suppose that I should let myself be struck in
the face without demanding satisfaction? I have enough French blood in
my veins to think it a very natural way of settling such a quarrel----"

"Was he hurt?" she asked, without waiting for him to finish.

"Very slightly. A sword-cut on the shoulder. The seconds interposed, or
we should have gone on----"

"I have no doubt you wanted to kill him! I shall denounce you to the
police!"

"As you please" said her husband indifferently, taking up his paper.
"But M. de Hauteville has retired from the scene: he had a carriage
waiting, and has crossed the frontier by this time. I assure you he is
perfectly safe Switzerland."

There was a taunt in his voice which exasperated his wife's temper
almost to madness.

"Scelerat!" she said, in a hissing, unnatural voice. "You would have
killed him if you could? Beware of my vengeance then, for I swear that
you shall suffer as he has suffered--and worse things too!"

Alan shrugged his shoulders. He had heard threats of this kind too often
to be greatly moved by them. And Mrs. Walcott, after a few ineffectual
remarks of the same sort, began to sob violently, and finally to work
herself into another hysterical fit, during which her husband coolly
rang the bell, and left her to Lisette's not very tender care.

When he returned she was once more quiet and subdued. He noticed that
she was reading a letter, which, at his entrance, she thrust--somewhat
ostentatiously--beneath her pillow. He took no notice. He was tired of
taking notice. As a rule, he let her go her own way. He had been married
for three years, and he had learned that, save in exceptional
circumstances, it was better not to interfere. He was relieved, and
somewhat surprised, when she suddenly declared herself better, and
wishful to leave her bed. Before long she was sitting at an open window,
with a cup of black coffee and a flask of cognac on a table before her,
while Alan fanned her with a great red fan and occasionally bathed her
temples with eau-de-cologne. He paid her these attentions with an air of
gentle gravity which became him well, but the slight fold between his
brows betokened irritation and weariness.

Cora Walcott seemed to delight in keeping him at her beck and call. She
did not let him stir from her side for the whole of that sultry summer
day. She