“While matters remain as they are, I cannot count your lordship among my friends.”
“Those are hard words to hear, mademoiselle. You mean?”
“I mean the slanders you have sanctioned against my cousin and the threats with which you have menaced him. His cause is mine; his enemies are my enemies.”
He made a stern, angry gesture, but held his temper in check.
“The Duchess has told you my wishes—that of her own will and at her own desire our marriage should be dissolved, in order that you may become my wife. But my full motive she could not tell you because she does not know it. It is—that I love you, Gabrielle; love, aye, worship the very ground you tread and the very air you breathe. For me all France holds no——”
“Spare me this added shame, my lord,” Gabrielle broke in, her voice vibrating and her eyes flaming with indignation.
“Shame!” he repeated, with an angry start.
“What is it but shame, the wrong you would do to the purest and sweetest wife man ever had; what else but shame that you should offer to prostrate your government to your own purposes; what but foulest shame that almost within hearing of the woman you would thus wrong you seek to pollute my ears with this infamous profession? If there be a spark of manhood in you, kindle it till it light up your soul sufficiently to save you and me from this unholy degradation.”
“Your passion but whets my love, Gabrielle. I am not a man to be set aside from a purpose once formed. My purpose is now set—you shall be my wife; and neither man nor devil nor God shall turn me.”
“I have but one word, then. I hold your offer to be vile and degrading, and I would rather die than falter for an instant in repudiating it.”