gained seemed worthless. Those quiet, sneering words of
his almost crushed me. On the load I had struggled to bear without
falling they laid one feather too much.

My voice broke. "You--devil!" I cried at him. "You dared to tell Raoul
that?"

Opposite, on her narrow little seat, Marianne stirred uneasily. Till now
our tones had been quiet, and she could not understand one word we said.
She is the soul of discretion and a triumph of good training in her walk
of life; but she loves me more than she loves any other creature on
earth, and now she could see and hear that the man had driven me to the
brink of hysterics. She would have liked to tear his face with her
nails, or choke him, I think. If I had given her the word, I believe she
would have tried with all her strength--which is not small--and a very
good will, to kill him. I was dimly conscious of what her restlessness
meant, and vaguely comforted too, by the thought of her supreme loyalty.
But I forgot Marianne when Godensky answered my question.

"Yes, I told him. It was the truth. And I've always understood that you
made a great point of never doing anything which you considered in the
least risque. So why should I suppose you would rather du Laurier didn't
know? You might already have mentioned it to him."

"He wouldn't believe you!" I exclaimed, desperately. And my only hope
was that I might be right.

"As a matter of fact, he didn't seem to at first, so I at once
understood that you hadn't spoken of our appointment. But it was too
late to atone for my carelessness, and I did the next best thing:
justified my veracity. I suggested that, if he didn't take my word for
it, he might stand where he could see us speaking together at the stage
door, and--"

"Ah, I am glad of that!" I cut in. "Then he saw that we didn't drive
away together."

"You jump at conclusions, just like less clever women. I hardly thought
you'd receive me into your carriage at the theatre, so I took the
precaution of warning du Laurier that he needn't expect to see that. You
would suggest a place for me to meet you, I said. When I knew it, I
would inform him if he chose to wait about somewhere for a few minutes."

"Raoul du Laurier would scorn to spy upon me!" I broke out.

"How hard you are on spies. And how little knowledge of human nature you
have, after all, if you don't understand that a man suddenly out of his
head with jealousy will do things of which he'd be incapable when he wa