She raised her eyebrows.
"Is it conceivable," she exclaimed, "that you do not know?"
"I knew of no other barrier save the difference in our social positions," he said gravely.
She was silent for a moment.
"You did not know, then—be calm, my friend—that Emily had a husband living?"
A sharp little cry, almost immediately smothered, broke from his lips. He looked at his companion aghast. A flood of new light seemed to be breaking in upon him.
"Married! Emily married!" he exclaimed. "And she never told me."
"She probably meant to in her own good time," the Duchess said. "Of course I do not know how matters were between you, only I fancied that some change had come to her during the last few months. I hoped that she was growing to care for somebody. She is too rare a woman to lead for ever a lonely life."
"But her husband?" he stammered.
"She will never do more," the Duchess said gravely, "than look upon his face through iron bars. He is a prisoner for life in one of the gloomiest and most impregnable of Siberian fortresses. Some day, if you like, I will tell you the story of her marriage. It was a most unhappy one."