“But what are the dangers?”
“That is just the worst of it, I do not know. I do not understand anything that is happening around. Anything! Anything! Except that Donovan Macbeth went mad because I loved him,—and I love you, too.”
“Come, Emma, let us be cool. We are allies now. Between us we shall find out the truth. When did you come to Fonval, and what has happened since?”
And then she told me her adventures. I reproduce them, stringing them together as best I can, to make them clearer, but as a matter of fact, her story was spread over a dialogue in which my questions guided the story-teller, who was ever ready to make digressions, and was loquacious in futilities.
Sometimes as we talked, a noise would interrupt our talk. Emma would sit up in terror of Lerne, and I could not prevent myself shivering, at the sight of her fear, for had there been an eye or an ear at the keyhole, the somber story would have been repeated in my case.
One way or another, I learned from Emma her origin and her early life. It has nothing to do with my story, and might easily be summed up in the phrase “How a foundling became a courtesan!”
Emma showed, during this confession, a sincerity which would have been called cynicism in the case of any one less candid.
With the same frankness, she went on:
“I got to know Lerne years ago. I was fifteen, and at the hospital at Nanthel. I had entered his service as a nurse? No! I had had a fight with my friend Léonie about Alcide, who was my man. Well, I am not ashamed of it! He is superb! He is a Colossus! My dear boy, he could chuck you about like a ball. My belt was too narrow a bracelet for him!
“Well, I got a blow with a knife—a nasty one, too. Just look!”