when he had first threatened and then
attacked her in The Yellow Room. She had, unfortunately, failed, and
felt herself condemned to be for ever at the mercy of this unscrupulous
wretch who was continually demanding her presence at clandestine
interviews. When he sent her the letter through the Post Office, asking
her to meet him, she had refused. The result of her refusal was the
tragedy of The Yellow Room. The second time he wrote asking for a
meeting, the letter reaching her in her sick chamber, she had avoided
him by sleeping with her servants. In that letter the scoundrel had
warned her that, since she was too ill to come to him, he would come
to her, and that he would be in her chamber at a particular hour on
a particular night. Knowing that she had everything to fear from
Ballmeyer, she had left her chamber on that night. It was then that the
incident of the "inexplicable gallery" occurred.

The third time she had determined to keep the appointment. He asked for
it in the letter he had written in her own room, on the night of the
incident in the gallery, which he left on her desk. In that letter he
threatened to burn her father's papers if she did not meet him. It was
to rescue these papers that she made up her mind to see him. She did not
for one moment doubt that the wretch would carry out his threat if she
persisted in avoiding him, and in that case the labours of her father's
lifetime would be for ever lost. Since the meeting was thus inevitable,
she resolved to see her husband and appeal to his better nature. It was
for this interview that she had prepared herself on the night the keeper
was killed. They did meet, and what passed between them may be imagined.
He insisted that she renounce Darzac. She, on her part, affirmed her
love for him. He stabbed her in his anger, determined to convict Darzac
of the crime. As Larsan he could do it, and had so managed things that
Darzac could never explain how he had employed the time of his absence
from the chateau. Ballmeyer's precautions were most cunningly taken.

Larsan had threatened Darzac as he had threatened Mathilde--with the
same weapon, and the same threats. He wrote Darzac urgent letters,
declaring himself ready to deliver up the letters that had passed
between him and his wife, and to leave them for ever, if he would pay
him his price. He asked Darzac to meet him for the purpose of arranging
the matter, appointing the time when Larsan would be with Mademois