"Yes. I punished him."
He was watching her very closely, for inwardly he had been wondering how she had taken his news. She was strangely agitated, so Maurice's troubled, jealous heart told him; her face was flushed, her eyes were wet and a tiny lace handkerchief which she twisted between her fingers was nothing but a damp rag.
"Oh! I hate him! I hate him!" she murmured as with an impatient gesture she brushed the gathering tears from her eyes. "Father had been so kind to him—so were we all. How could he? how could he?"
"His duty, I suppose," said St. Genis magnanimously.
"His duty?" she retorted scornfully.
"To the cause which he served."
"Duty to a usurper, a brigand, the enemy of his country. Was he, then, paid to serve the Corsican?"
"Probably."
"His being in trade—buying gloves at Grenoble—was all a plant then?"
"I am afraid so," said St. Genis, who much against his will now was sinking ever deeper and deeper in the quagmire of lying and cowardice into which he had allowed himself to drift.