an who has come between us."

Cecilia bit her lip and turned her face from the light.

"Then it is true," Guido said, after a silence. "There is a man whom you
really love, a man whom you would really marry and to whom you could
really be faithful."

"Yes. It is true. Everything I wrote you is true."

"Who is he?"

She was silent again.

"Do you hope that I shall ever forgive you for what you have done to
me?"

"Yes. I pray heaven that you may!"

"Leave heaven out of the question. You have turned my life into
something like what you call hell. Do I know the man you love?"

"Yes," Cecilia answered, after a moment's hesitation.

"Do I often meet him? Have I met him often since you have loved him?"

She said nothing, but stood still with bent head and clasped hands.

"Why do you not answer me?" he asked sternly.

"You must never know his name," she said, in a low voice.

"Have I no right to know who has ruined my life?"

"I have. Blame me. Visit it on me."

He laughed, not harshly now, but gently and sarcastically.

"You women are fond of offering yourselves as expiatory victims for your
own sins, for you know very well that we shall not hurt you! After all,
you cannot help yourself if you have fallen in love with some one else.
I suppose I ought to be sorry for you. I probably shall be, when I know
who he is!"

He laughed again, already despising the man she had preferred in his
stead. His words had cut her, but she said nothing, for she was in dread
lest the slightest word should betray the truth.

"You say that I know him," Guido continued, his cheeks beginning to
flush feverishly, "and you would not answer me when I asked you if I had
often met him since you have loved him. That means that I have, of
course. You were too honest to lie, and too much frightened to tell the
truth. I meet him often. Then he is one of a score of men whom I know
better than all the others. There are not many men whom I meet often. It
cannot be very hard to find out which of them it is."

Cecilia turned her face away, resting one hand on the back of the chair,
and a deep blush rose in her cheeks. But she spoke steadily.

"You can never find out," she said. "He does not love me. He does not
guess that I love him. But I will not answer any more questions, for you
must not know who he is."

"Why not? Do you think I shall quarrel with him and make him fight a
duel with me?"

"Perhaps."

"That is absurd," Guido answe