"It makes me ashamed of my sex to hear you say such things. That a woman can so far lose her pride as to——"
"Oh, other women do it in other ways. Do you think I haven't seen how you have been trying to make some one here like you?—doing your utmost, without any thoughts of pride or self-respect.—And how you have failed? Yes, failed. And if you don't believe me, ask him yourself—ask him who it is that could bring him to her, just by raising her finger. It's to me he would come, not to you—to me who have never given him look or thought."
Madeleine paled, then went scarlet. "That's a direct untruth. You!—and not to egg a man on, if you see he admires you! You know every time a passer-by looks at you in the street. You feed on such looks—yes, and return them, too. I have seen you, my lady, looking and being looked at, by a stranger, in a way no decent woman allows.—For the rest, I'll trouble you to mind your own business. Whatever I do or don't do, trust me, I shall at least take care not to make myself the laughing-stock of the place. Yes, you have only succeeded in making yourself ridiculous. For while you were cringing before him, and aspiring to die for his sake, he was making love behind your back to another girl. For the last six months. Every one knew it, it seems, but you."
She had spoken with unconcealed anger, and now turned to leave the room. But Louise was at the door before her, and spread herself across it.
"That's a lie, Madeleine! Of your own making. You shall prove it to me before you go out of this room. How dare you say such a thing!—how dare you!"
Madeleine looked at her with cold aversion, and drew back to avoid touching her.
"Prove it?" she echoed. "Are his own words not proof enough! He told the whole story that night, just as he had first told all about you. It had been going on for months. Sometimes, you were hardly out of his room, before the other was in. And if you don't believe me, ask the person you're so proud of having attracted, without raising your finger."
Louise moved away from the door, and went back to the table, on which she leaned heavily. All the blood had left her face and the dark rings below her eyes stood out with alarming distinctness. Madeleine felt a sudden compunction at what she had done.
"It's entirely your own fault that I told you anything whatever about it," she said, heartily annoyed with herself. "You had no right to provoke me by saying what you did. I declare, Louise, to be with you makes one just like you. If it's any consolation to you to know it, he was drunk at the time, and there's a possibility it may not be true."
"Go away—go out of my room!" cried Louise. And Madeleine went, without delay, having almost a physical sensation about her throat of the slender hands stretched so threateningly towards her.—And this unpleasant feeling remained with her until she turned the corner of the street.