iness. I could not stoop so low. You possibly think of outrage;
for myself, I have no such thoughts."

He flung his cigar coolly into the fire.

"The smoke is unpleasant to you, no doubt, madame?" he said, and rising
at once, he took a chafing-dish from the hearth, burnt perfumes, and
purified the air. The Duchess's astonishment was only equaled by her
humiliation. She was in this man's power; and he would not abuse his
power. The eyes in which love had once blazed like flame were now quiet
and steady as stars. She trembled. Her dread of Armand was increased by
a nightmare sensation of restlessness and utter inability to move; she
felt as if she were turned to stone. She lay passive in the grip of
fear. She thought she saw the light behind the curtains grow to a blaze,
as if blown up by a pair of bellows; in another moment the gleams of
flame grew brighter, and she fancied that three masked figures suddenly
flashed out; but the terrible vision disappeared so swiftly that she
took it for an optical delusion.

"Madame," Armand continued with cold contempt, "one minute, just one
minute is enough for me, and you shall feel it afterwards at every
moment throughout your lifetime, the one eternity over which I have
power. I am not God. Listen carefully to me," he continued, pausing to
add solemnity to his words. "Love will always come at your call. You
have boundless power over men: but remember that once you called love,
and love came to you; love as pure and true-hearted as may be on earth,
and as reverent as it was passionate; fond as a devoted woman's, as a
mother's love; a love so great indeed, that it was past the bounds of
reason. You played with it, and you committed a crime. Every woman has a
right to refuse herself to love which she feels she cannot share; and
if a man loves and cannot win love in return, he is not to be pitied,
he has no right to complain. But with a semblance of love to attract
an unfortunate creature cut off from all affection; to teach him to
understand happiness to the full, only to snatch it from him; to rob him
of his future of felicity; to slay his happiness not merely today,
but as long as his life lasts, by poisoning every hour of it and every
thought--this I call a fearful crime!"

"Monsieur----"

"I cannot allow you to answer me yet. So listen to me still. In any case
I have rights over you; but I only choose to exercise one--the right of
the judge over the criminal, so that I may ar