"Yes."
"After you had parted from me? Sharp work, upon my life."
He laughs—a short, unmirthful laugh—and taking his hands from her shoulders, moves back from her, yet always with his eyes on her face.
"You should be glad," she says, slowly.
"No doubt. So he was your confidant—your father-confessor, was he? All my misdemeanors were laid bare to him. And then came pity for one linked to such an unsympathetic soul as mine, and then naturally came what pity is akin to! It is a pretty story. And for its hero 'mine own familiar friend.'" He laughs again.
She makes a movement as though to leave him, but he stops her.
"No, do not go yet," he says. "Let me congratulate you. Le roi est mort, vive le roi. My successor, it seems, was not difficult to find; and—By-the-by, why are you alone now? Why is not your new lover by your side?"
"My first lover—not my new lover," she says, bitterly, speaking now with some spirit.
"I didn't count, I suppose."
"You—!" She draws her breath quickly, and, then, having subdued the indignation that had almost overcome her, goes on quietly: "you never loved me. There was never a moment in all my knowledge of you when I could have flattered myself with the thought that I was more to you than a cousin."