eyes out of him if he laughs like that," said
Tetchen, looking as though she were ready to put her threat into
execution upon the instant.

"Peter Steinmarc, you are mistaken in this," said Madame Staubach.
"You had better let me see you in private."

"Mistaken, am I? Oh! am I mistaken in thinking that she was alone
during the whole night with Ludovic? A man does not like such
mistakes as that. I tell you that I have done with her,--done with
her,--done with her! She is a bad piece. She does not ring sound.
Madame Staubach, I respect you, and am sorry for you; but you know
the truth as well as I do."

"Man," she said to him, "you are ungrateful, cruel, and unjust."

"Aunt Charlotte," said Linda, "he has done me the only favour that
I could accept at his hands. It is true that I have done that which,
had he been a man, would have prevented him from seeking to make me
his wife. All that is true. I own it."

"There; you hear her, Madame Staubach."

"And you shall hear me by-and-by," said Madame Staubach.

"But it is no thought of that that has made him give me up,"
continued Linda. "He knows that he never could have got my hand. I
told him that I would die first, and he has believed me. It is very
well that he should give me up; but no one else, no other man alive,
would have been base enough to have spoken to any woman as he has
spoken to me."

"It is all very well for you to say so," said Peter.

"Aunt Charlotte, I hope I may never be asked to hear another word
from his lips, or to speak another word to his ears." Then Linda
escaped from the room, thinking as she went that God in His mercy had
saved her at last.

CHAPTER XV

All January had passed by. That thirtieth of January had come and
gone which was to have made Linda Tressel a bride, and Linda was
still Linda Tressel. But her troubles were not therefore over, and
Peter Steinmarc was once again her suitor. It may be remembered
how he had reviled her in her aunt's presence, how he had reminded
her of her indiscretion, and how he had then rejected her; but,
nevertheless, in the first week of February he was again her suitor.

Madame Staubach had passed a very troubled and uneasy month.
Though she was minded to take her niece's part when Linda was so
ungenerously attacked by the man whom she had warmed in the bosom of
her family, still she was most unwilling that Linda should triumph.
Her feminine instincts prompted her to take Linda's part on t