n prayer. Bernadine
spoke no more of these things. He talked to her kindly, keeping up
always his role of respectful, but hopeful, admirer.

"You will come again soon?" he begged, when at last she insisted upon
going.

She hesitated.

"It is so difficult," she murmured. "If my husband knew----"

Bernadine laughed and touched her fingers caressingly.

"Need one tell him?" he whispered. "You see, I trust you. I pray that
you will come."

* * * * *

Bernadine was a man rarely moved towards emotion of any sort; yet even
he was conscious of a certain sense of excitement as he stood looking
out upon the Embankment from the windows of Paul Hagon's sitting-room a
few days later. Madame was sitting on the settee. It was for her answer
to a question that he waited.

"Monsieur," she said at last, turning slowly towards him, "it must be
'No.' Indeed I am sorry, for you have been very charming to me, and
without you I should have been dull. But to come to your rooms and dine
alone to-night, it is impossible."

"Your husband cannot return before the morning," Bernadine reminded her.

"It makes no difference," she answered. "Paul is sometimes fierce and
rough, but he is generous, and all his life he has worshipped me. He
behaves strangely at times, but I know that he cares--all the time more,
perhaps, than I deserve."

"And there is no one else." Bernadine asked softly, "who can claim even
the smallest place in your heart?"

"Monsieur," the woman begged, "you must not ask me that. I think that
you had better go away."

Bernadine stood quite still for several moments. It was the climax
towards which he had steadfastly guided the course of this mild
intrigue.

"Madame," he declared, "You must not send me away! You shall not!"

She held out her hand.

"Then you must not ask impossible things," she answered.

Then Bernadine took the plunge. He became suddenly very grave.

"Sophia," he said, "I am keeping a great secret from you, and I can do
it no longer. When you speak to me of your husband you drive me mad. If
I believed that really you loved him, I would go away and leave it to
chance whether or not you ever discovered the truth. As it is----"

"Well?" she interposed breathlessly.

"As it is," he continued, "I am going to tell you now. Your husband has
deceived you; he is deceiving you every moment."

She looked at him incredulously.

"You mean that there is another woman?"