“Then—feel sure that I love you—no man but you—now and always.”
“Oh, Maxine!” he stammered. “Am I a fool, or wise, to let myself believe you?”
“You are wise,” I answered, as firmly as if I deserved the full faith I was claiming from him as my right. “If you wouldn’t believe, without my insisting, without my explaining and defending myself, I’d tell you nothing. But you do believe, just because you love me—I see it in your face, and thank God for it. So I’ll tell you this. Count Godensky hates me, because I couldn’t and wouldn’t love him, and he hates you because he thinks I love you. He—” I paused for a second. A wild thought had flashed like the light of a beacon in my brain. If I could say something now which, when the blow fell—if it did fall—might come back to Raoul’s mind and convince him instantly that it was Godensky, not I, who had stolen the treaty and broken him! If I could make him believe the whole thing a monstrous plot of Godensky’s to revenge himself on a woman who’d refused him, by cleverly implicating her in her lover’s ruin, by throwing guilt upon her while she was, in reality, innocent! If I could suggest that to Raoul now, while his ears were open, I might hold his love against the world, no matter what happened afterward.
It was a mad idea and a wicked one, perhaps; but I was at my wits’ end and desperate. Though not guilty of this one crime which I would shift upon his shoulders if I could, as a means of escaping from the trap he’d helped to set, Godensky was capable of it, and guilty of others, I was sure, which had never been brought home to him. I believed that he, too, was a spy, just as I was; and far worse, because if he were one he betrayed his own country, while I never had done that, never would.
All these thoughts rushed through my head in a second; and I think that Raoul could hardly have noticed the pause before I began to speak again.
“He—Godensky—would do anything to part you and me,” I said. “There’s no plot too sly and vile for him to conceive and carry out against me—and you. No lie too base for him to tell you—or others—about me. He sent me a letter at the theatre—soon after you’d left me the first time. In it, he said that I must give him a few minutes after the play, unless I wanted some dreadful harm to come to you—something concerning your career. That frightened me, though I might have guessed it was only a trick. Indeed, I did guess, but I couldn’t be sure, so I saw him. I didn’t want you to know—I tell you that frankly, Raoul. Because I’d told you not to come home with me, I hoped you wouldn’t find out that I meant to let Count Godensky drive part of the way back with me and Marianne. I ran the risk, and—the very thing happened which I ought to have known would happen. As for what he had to tell me, it was nothing; only vague hints of trouble from which he, as one of an inner circle, might save you, if I—would be grateful enough.”
“The scoundrel!” broke out Raoul, convinced now, his eyes blazing. “I’ll—”
He stopped suddenly. But I knew what had been on his lips to say. He meant to send a challenge to Count Godensky. I must prevent him from doing that.
“No, Raoul,” I said, as if he had finished his sentence, “you musn’t fight. For my sake, you mustn’t. Don’t you see, it’s just what he’d like best? It would be a way of doing me the most dreadful injury. Think of the scandal. Oh, you will think of it, when you’re cooler. For you, I would not fear much, for I know what a swordsman you are, and what a shot—far superior to Godensky, and with right on your side. But I would fear for myself. Promise you won’t bring this trouble upon me.”
“I promise,” he answered. “Oh, my darling, what wouldn’t I promise you, to atone for my brutal injustice to an angel? How thankful I am that I came to you to-night! I meant not to come. I was afraid of myself, and what I might do. But at last I couldn’t hold out against the something that seemed forcing me here in spite of all resistance. Do you forgive me?”