‘Only what suited me,’ replied the girl, coldly, stung by the coldness and utter heartlessness of this man.
‘Oh!’ with a smile. ‘Did it include my name?’
‘No,’ curtly.
‘Ah!’ with a long indrawn breath, ‘you are more sensible than I gave you credit for.’
Kitty rose to her feet and crossed rapidly over to where he sat calm and smiling.
‘Gaston Vandeloup!’ she hissed in his ear, while her face was quite distorted by the violence of her passion, ‘when I met you I was an innocent girl—you ruined me, and then cast me off as soon as you grew weary of your toy. I thought you loved me, and,’ with a stifled sob, ‘God help me, I love you still.’
‘Yes, my Bebe,’ he said, in a caressing tone, taking her hand.
‘No! no,’ she cried, wrenching them away, while an angry spot of colour glowed on her cheek, ‘I loved you as you were—not as you are now—we are done with sentiment, M. Vandeloup,’ she said, sneering, ‘and now our relations to one another will be purely business ones.’
He bowed and smiled.
‘So glad you understand the position,’ he said, blandly; ‘I see the age of miracles is not yet past when a woman can talk sense.’