"I am doing a very unusual thing in coming to see you," she said, "but

you have forced me to it, and I am quite helpless."

A faint sound came from him, and she was aware that he was leaning

forward to see her face, so she dropped her eyes, partly to let him look

at her, and partly to avoid meeting his gaze.

"I heard your speech in the piazza this morning. It would be useless to

disguise the fact that some of its references were meant for me."

He did not speak, and she played with the glove in her lap, and

continued in the same soft voice: "If I were a man, I suppose I should challenge you. Being a woman, I can

only come to you and tell you that you are wrong."

"Wrong?"

"Cruelly, terribly, shamefully wrong."

"You mean to tell me...."

He was stammering in a husky voice, and she said quite calmly: "I mean to tell you that in substance and in fact what you implied was

false."

There was a dry glitter in her eyes which she tried to subdue, for she

knew that he was looking at her still.

"If ... if...."--his voice was thick and indistinct--"if you tell me that

I have done you an injury...."

"You have--a terrible injury."

She could hear his breathing, but she dared not look up, lest he should

see something in her face.

"Perhaps you think it strange," she said, "that I should ask you to

accept my assurance only. But though you have done me a great wrong I

believe you will accept it."

"If ... if you give me your solemn word of honour that what I said--what

I implied--was false, that rumour and report have slandered you, that it

is all a cruel and baseless calumny...."

She raised her head, looked him full in the face.

"I do give it," she said.

"Then I believe you," he answered. "With all my heart and soul, I

believe you."

She dropped her eyes again, and turning with her thumb an opal ring on

her finger, she began to use the blandishments which had never failed

with other men.

"I do not say that I am altogether without blame," she said. "I may have

lived a thoughtless life amid scenes of poverty and sorrow. If so,

perhaps it has been partly the fault of the men about me. When is a

woman anything but what the men around have made her?"




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