I received you with the intention, I
confess, and I beg your pardon, of amusing myself a little at your
expense."

"But, madame, this evening, even, you intended to explain to me the
mystery of your triple widowhood--the death of your husbands and the
presence successively, of the filibuster, the----"

Angela interrupted the Gascon by saying, "Do you not hear a footfall? Is
it Youmaeale?"

"I hear nothing," said Croustillac, overwhelmed in the view of his
ruined hopes, though he held himself in readiness for anything, now that
a true love had extinguished his stupid and foolish vanity.

"Let us go further," said Blue Beard; "the Caribbean is among the orange
trees by the fountain, perhaps."

"But, madame, this mystery?"

"The mystery," replied Angela, "if it is one, cannot, must not be solved
by you. My promise to reveal this secret to you to-night was a jest of
which I am now heartily ashamed, I tell you; and if I kept this foolish
promise it would be to make you the object of another mystery more
culpable still."

"Ah, madame," said the chevalier quickly, "this is very cruel."

"What more would you ask, sir? I accuse myself and beg your pardon,"
said Angela, in a sweet and sad voice. "Forget the folly of what I have
said; think no longer of my hand, which can belong to no one; but
sometimes remember the recluse of Devil's Cliff, who is, perhaps, at
once very culpable and very innocent. And then," she continued
hesitatingly, "as a remembrance of Blue Beard, you will permit me, will
you not, to offer you some of the diamonds of which you were so enamored
before you had seen me."

The chevalier blushed with shame and anger; the pure feeling which he
felt for Angela made him feel as derogatory an offer which at one time
would, doubtless, have been accepted without the slightest scruple.
"Madame," said he, with as much pride as bitterness, "you have accorded
me hospitality for two days; to-morrow I shall leave; the only request I
make of you is to give me a guide. As to your offer, it wounds me
doubly----"

"Sir!"

"Yes, madame, that you should believe me low enough to accept payment
for the humiliating circumstances----"

"Sir, such was not my idea."

"Madame, I am poor, I am ridiculous and vain; I am what is termed a man
of expediencies; but even I have my point of honor."

"But, sir----"

"But, madame, that I should barter my pride and will as an exchange for
the hospitality offered me, would be a b