"You—have—suffered?" she repeated. "Ah, no, not you! It is I——." She stopped and sighed deeply.
He almost forced her, by her hand, into a chair and knelt beside her.
"Leslie, Leslie!" he cried, striving hard to speak calmly and coolly. "Listen to me. I'll try and explain. I'll try and tell you how this cruel thing has been brought about. It will be hard work, for the words sound like a jumble in my ears, and it is all I can do to keep myself from taking you in my arms—ah, don't shrink, don't be frightened! I will leave you to be the judge when—when you have heard all. Leslie, that woman Finetta——."
She started and turned her face from him.
"Leslie! Leslie! She lied. She told you she was to be my wife. It was not true, then or ever! As Heaven is my witness, there was not even love between us, on my side. I had parted from her two days before——."
"Oh, hush!" she broke out with a kind of jerk. "I remember every word—every word. It is burnt into my heart."
"It was false!" he said vehemently. "I can understand, imagine, all she would say! She is an actress—would have deceived a woman of the world, much more easily one all innocence and purity like yourself, dearest."
She looked at him as if a glimmer of hope was dawning, then her face clouded again, and she tried to take her hand from his, but unsuccessfully.
"You—you forget," she murmured. "The portrait. You sent it to her the day you sent my gift to me! Your portrait!"
He could have groaned.