"Ah, I forgot—you never go there now because of 'politics'; it is too dangerous!"
He was not to be caught so. "I did not say that I never went," he replied coolly. "I have been occasionally. Affairs demanded it. As a matter of fact I was there this afternoon."
"I knew that," said Horatia.
"I thought so," said her husband to himself. "May I ask how you knew it?"
"After what those women said, I came to see."
The young man shrugged his shoulders. "In spite of all my adjurations and your promise! Well, let us hope that nobody saw you!"
Horatia gave a little gasp of anger. "And what of the people who have seen you going there?"
"A man must take some risks," replied the Comte indifferently. "I knew that there was a certain amount of danger, but I did not expect that you, of all people, would be the person to denounce me."
His adroitness in constantly pushing her from her position was maddening. "O, if I were only a man!" she broke out. "Do you really think that I am still the dupe, as I have been so long, of your pitiful 'politics'? It is all lies—lies everywhere; they choke me—lies here, lies in Brittany——did that woman ever really have any letters from the Duchesse de Berry—were not all your interviews with her just a cloak? Why, I could almost believe the Regent herself to be a lie, too—a lie incarnate, as you are!"
"Horatia, for God's sake control yourself," said Armand, rather anxiously. "You do not know what you are saying, and this agitation is very bad for you."