“You are sure it is for to-day that you are asked?” she questioned.
“Oh, yes. She told me that she had invited you, but that you had not as yet accepted.”
“So you are in the plot, too,” she said slowly, and the eyes with which she scanned his face were quite black. “That is a thing I had not suspected.”
“No,” answered Selden quickly, “I am not in any plot. But if I were, I should be on your side, madame; I pray you to believe it.”
She looked at him yet a moment as though striving to read his very inmost thought. Then she glanced around.
“Let us sit down,” she said, and led the way to a bench. “Now you must tell me what you know—everything. In the first place, you know, do you not, that Prince Danilo is my husband?”
“Yes; I know that.”
“As legally my husband as the woman you marry will be your wife.”
“Yes.”
“Except that I have no claim upon his estates or his title, and our children, if we had any, could not succeed to them.”