"I did, and I was quite wrong in making you that promise."
"That is quite beside the mark; it has nothing whatever to do with the matter. Having made the promise, you were bound to keep it. I relied implicitly on your good faith. I left you, intending to return and hear your decision. What do I find out? That you have simply been deceiving me, duping me—most cleverly as you thought, most foolishly as you will see. You imagined that on the twentieth I should come to see you, and find you married and gone. You have doubtless laughed to think how you should befool me."
"I do not deny it," she said, contemptuously.
A strange light flashed in his eyes.
"I would have you beware," he said. "I told you long ago that my overweening love for you was driving me mad. Be careful how you anger me."
"I have the same amount of contempt for your anger as for your love," she said.
"Take care! I have told you before, desperate men do desperate deeds. Take care! I have found out your pretty plot, and am here to spoil it."
"What have you discovered?" she asked.
"For the first thing, that while you have been so cleverly deceiving all London, you were engaged the whole time to Earle Moray, the lover you so kindly left for me."
"After that?" she asked.