“I was in Méricourt—for how many days?” said Ned. “And is this all your confidence, Mademoiselle?”
She flushed and bit her lips. The tears were in her eyes.
“You are always cold,” she said. “You do not pity me or make allowance. To be wooed to worship an ideal; to be wooed through the hunger in one’s soul for the truth that God seemed to withhold! When he taught me that religion of equality, he became my God. I saw the disorder of the world resolve itself into love and innocence. How was I, inexperienced, to know how a libertine will spend years, if need be, in undermining a trust that he may indulge a minute’s happiness?”
She had spoken so far with self-restraint. Now, suddenly, she flashed out superbly—
“You would not do the same—oh, mon Dieu, no! but you will condone his wickedness—yes, that is it! Liberty to you all is the liberty to act as you like; to use the State and abuse it; to use the woman and throw her aside!”
“Hush!” said Ned, a little startled and concerned. “Your liberty, I take it, you have committed to the keeping of my lord. He may curtail it, if you talk so loud.”
She drew back imperiously.
“The old tipsy man!” she cried, in a pregnant voice. “I decoy, and I repulse, and I madden him. I have learnt my lesson, monsieur. Hark, then!”
She held up her hand. From the dining-room adjacent came a quavering chaunt—the maudlin sing-song of ancient inebriety.
“I know,” said Ned. “He is half-way through his second bottle.”