"You defy me?"
"Defy? It seems I am always at the mercy of Tiberius."
"Can you look at me, and deny that you are screening your lover?"
She quickly lifted her head, with a peculiar haughty movement that reminded him of a desperate stag at bay, and he never forgot the expression of her eyes.
"I deny that Miss Gordon's accepted lover has any right to catechise me concerning a subject which, were his suspicions correct, should invest it with a sanctity inviolable by wanton curiosity."
He recoiled slightly as from a lash.
"Miss Gordon is on the eve of sailing through the sunny isles of Greece; and while she is absent I purpose finding my nepenthe in my hunt for murderers among Montana wilds. You have defied me, and I will do my worst, nay, my very best to catch and hang that cowardly rogue who adroitly used your handkerchief as the instrument to aid his crime."
She walked a few steps, putting once more between them the table, against which she leaned.
"If you are successful, and the mystery of that awful murder should be unravelled, you will then comprehend something of the desperation that makes me endure even this crucifixion of soul; and in that day, when you discover the fugitive lover, you will blush for the taunts aimed at a defenceless and sorely-stricken woman."
"Nevertheless, I bend my energies henceforth to his capture and punishment."