erhaps too
late. Do you wish me to tell you what I concealed from you on seeing you
so troubled? You did not lose much time in coming from the station
hither, and probably you did not look out of your cab twice. But you were
seen. By whom? By Montfanon. He told me so this morning almost on the
threshold of the Palais Castagna. If I had not gathered from some words
uttered by your wife that she was ignorant of your presence in Rome,
I--do you hear?--I should have told her of it. Judge now of your
situation!"

He spoke with an agitation which was not assumed, so much was he troubled
by the evidence of danger which Gorka's obstinacy presented. The latter,
who had begun to collect himself, had a strange light in his eyes.
Without doubt his companion's nervousness marked the moment he was
awaiting to strike a decisive blow. He rose with so sudden a start that
Dorsenne drew back. He seized both of his hands, but with such force that
not a quiver of the muscles escaped him:

"Yes, Julien, you have the means of consoling me, you have it," said he
in a voice again hoarse with emotion.

"What is it?" asked the novelist.

"What is it? You are an honest man, Dorsenne; you are a great artist; you
are my friend, and a friend allied to me by a sacred bond, almost a
brother-in-arms; you, the grandnephew of a hero who shed his blood by the
side of my grandfather at Somo-Sierra. Give me your word of honor that
you are absolutely certain Madame Steno is not Maitland's mistress, that
you never thought it, have never heard it said, and I will believe you, I
will obey you! Come," continued he, pressing the writer's hand with more
fervor, "I see you hesitate!"

"No," said Julien, disengaging himself from the wild grasp, "I do not
hesitate. I am sorry for you. Were I to give you that word, would it have
any weight with you for five minutes? Would you not be persuaded
immediately that I was perjuring myself to avoid a misfortune?"

"You hesitate," interrupted Boleslas. Then, with a burst of wild
laughter, he said, "It is then true! I like that better! It is frightful
to know it, but one suffers less--To know it' As if I did not know she
had lovers before me, as if it were not written on Alba's every feature
that she is Werekiew's child, as if I had not heard it said seventy times
before knowing her that she had loved Branciforte, San Giobbe, Strabane,
ten others. Before, during, or after, what difference does it make? Ah, I
was sure on k