“If he has not struck you down,” she said, with the intention of pushing him to the last extremity, “be sure he will do it, and that, too, before the world.”
“He does not dare!”
“Bah! Who is to prevent him, eh? Are you the man to do it?”
“Take care, Madame Catherine Barrau! Don’t excite me beyond all reason. It wouldn’t take much urging for me to kill him—your charming husband.”
“Come, now, I defy you! You are too much of a coward!”
Though they were speaking in muffled tones, they were thoroughly aroused and the energy of mad passion controlled their words.
“If only you could have loved me, fair tigress,” said Firmin in a whisper, overcome by her imperial beauty.
“I do not love people who are the laughing-stock of the village. Everybody is making fun of you. Were you less a coward Savin would have paid for his insults from you before this. Bruno would have found a way to have punished him.”
Bruno! Catherine well knew how to touch Firmin’s jealousy. For a month she had listened to his advances half condescendingly, but Bruno’s name always strangely affected him. Was Bruno his rival? At any rate, her way of exasperating him was successful.
“The gamekeeper shall die before to-morrow morning!” said he desperately.