"Only last night, monsieur," she said eagerly. "Only last night for the first time."
"It is well that you admit at least that!" he jeered, in a sort of furious irony. "I congratulate you, mademoiselle! My profound respects! In a single visit then you have accomplished wonders, even with so beautiful a face and figure! You have made Jean Laparde famous all over the world; and you have made me perhaps—a murderer!"
She stared at him wide-eyed. What did he mean?
"But, monsieur—monsieur—I swear it to you!" she stammered. "It was only last night for the first time."
He laughed mirthlessly, and shrugged his shoulders.
"As you will, mademoiselle! A night or a thousand spent with Monsieur Laparde, it is all one to me! It is your own affair! But"—his voice rose suddenly in uncontrollable passion—"but, sacré nom de Dieu, there is something that is my affair! That cloak! That hat! Where did you get them?" He was clutching with one hand at the garment, pulling at it with vicious twitches to emphasise his words.
She drew back from him, the blood hot and burning in her cheeks. A night or a thousand with Jean! He thought—he thought—that! And he talked of her hat and cloak! What did they matter, what did anything matter, except that—that shameful thought of his that stabbed at her, and, with its sudden pain, brought a horrible giddiness and a horrible ringing in her ears?
"Answer me!" he cried fiercely. "Why are you wearing those things now? Where did you get them? Why were you masquerading last night in that hat and cloak, that belong to Mademoiselle Bliss, when I saw you enter here?"
"Mademoiselle Bliss!"—she could only repeat the words numbly. "It is her hat and coat?" The room seemed to swim around her. She put her hands to her eyes. A new terror was creeping upon her. The hat and cloak belonged to Mademoiselle Bliss! Vaguely, dimly, understanding began to come. He had thought that she was Mademoiselle Bliss, and because of that—no, no! The bon Dieu would not let her suffer that too! It was so terrible—everything was so terrible this night—there could not be anything more, for it was already beyond what she could bear. She stretched out her hands to him imploringly. "It—it is not because you thought that I was Mademoiselle Bliss"—she was pleading piteously for a denial—"that—that you—that it is because of me you fought with Jean, and that Jean is—is—"
"Are you trying to play with me?" he rasped out savagely. "What else but that? You were here all night last night. Yes, I thought you were Mademoiselle Bliss! Yes, it was because of that I would have killed Monsieur Laparde! Is that plain enough, mademoiselle? And now will you answer me? Where did you get those things, and for what hellish reason were you wearing them? Answer me, I tell you!" He caught her, and shook her violently. "Answer me!" he fumed.