“Malgat! Have they talked to you about Malgat?”
And, as he hesitated to answer, she added:—
“Ah, answer me! Don’t you see that your hesitation is an insult?”
“Well—yes.”
As if in utter despair, she raised her hands to heaven, calling God, as it were, to witness, and asking for inspiration from on high. Then she added suddenly,—
“But I have proofs, irrefutable proofs of Malgat’s rascality.”
And, without waiting for another word, she hurried into the adjoining room. Daniel, moved to the bottom of his heart, remained standing where he was, immovable, like a statue.
He was utterly confounded and overcome by the charm of that marvellous voice, which passed through the whole gamut of passion with such a sonorous ring, and yet with such sweet languor, that it seemed by turns to sob and to threaten, to sigh with sadness and to thunder with wrath.
“What a woman!” he said to himself, repeating thus unconsciously the words uttered by M. de Brevan.
“What a woman! And how well she defends herself.”