“Encouragement, Monsieur?” exclaimed the Duchesse. “Whence did you derive that?”
The Deputy made her a bow. “You have been—unintentionally, no doubt—kinder than you knew.”
“Do you mean to say that I—I—gave you encouragement, Monsieur?” All the Duchesse de Trélan was in the astonishment of that emphasized pronoun.
“Not openly, Madame, I admit—but in a way you were unconscious of.”
“Most certainly I was unconscious of it!” said Valentine, in a tone of the strongest indignation. “Your imagination, Monsieur le Député, runs away with you!”
“Madame, I only used my eyes,” pleaded Camain, undeterred by her displeasure—seeming, indeed, rather to enjoy it. And he sat down again on the seat. “You would not, naturally, be aware of it, chère Madame. But cast your mind back a week—to the day of the arrest. It was on that day that I first received hope. . . . I see you do not believe me. Must I convince you then?”
“You cannot, Monsieur.”
Camain bent nearer. “Do you challenge me? Ah, Madame Marie, but you will be angry with me! It was, then—you remember that day, Mlle Dufour was with me—it was the way you looked . . . in which I saw you looking . . . the hostile way, in short, in which you looked at poor Rose.”
“Rose . . . the way I looked . . . you think—is it possible that you imagine, Monsieur Camain, that I was jealous of your mistress?” A white and royal anger possessed the Duchesse, and she got up from the stone bench more like a queen than a concierge.
“I knew you would be angry,” said Camain plaintively, gazing up at her. “But as I live, I saw you looking at her once or twice in a manner which seemed to me to admit of only one explanation.”