She opens the scrawl he has sent her awhile ago, holding it open before his eyes. There is neither name nor address upon it.
"I, upon my word, I beg your pardon. It was entirely—I give you my word of honor—unintentional; a mere omission. I was so flurried, you see, and somehow I forgot. Can you forgive me?" he stammers.
"With pleasure," she returns, coolly, looking away from his shamed countenance. "But we have digressed from our subject. We were talking of Maud and the note you hold. How can you withhold it from her when you know that her very life hangs upon it?"
"Reine, do you know that I hate that woman?" he cries, with subdued fierceness.
"Then you never loved her," she replied, decisively.
"I did; but her falsity turned my love to hate," he answers, moodily.
"No," she answers.
"'That is not love
That alters where it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.'"
An utter silence which she breaks again, anxiously: "You will not refuse my prayer? Give me the note and let me go to Maud."