He breathed heavily; his eyes had a terrible look in them; he put his hand on his heart. For a moment the longing assailed him to spring upon her and throttle her as a man may a dangerous beast. He could not speak, a leaden weight seemed to shut his lips.
He never doubted that she knew his whole history from Vàsàrhely.
'It was an ingenious device,' she pursued, in her honeyed, even tones, 'but it was scarcely wise. Things are always found out some time or another—at least, men's secrets are. A woman can keep hers. My dear friend, you are really a criminal. It is very strange that Wanda of all people should have made such a misalliance, and had such an imposture passed off on her! I belong to her family; I ought to abhor you; and yet I can imagine your temptation if I cannot forgive it. Still it was a foolish thing to do, not worthy a man of your wit; and in France, I believe, the punishment for such an assumption is some years' imprisonment; and here, you know (perhaps you do not know?), your marriage would be null and void if she chose.'
He made a movement towards her, and for the moment, though she was a woman of great courage, her spirit quailed before the look she met.
'Hold your peace!' he said savagely. 'Speak truth, if you can. What has Vàsàrhely told you?'
Vàsàrhely had told her nothing, but she looked him full in the face with perfect serenity, and answered—'All!'
He never doubted her, he could not doubt her; what she said was met by too full confirmation from his memory and his conscience.
'He gave me his word,' he muttered.
She smiled. 'His word to you, when he is in love with your wife? The miracle is that he has not told her. She would divorce you, and after a decent interval I dare say she would marry him, if only pour balayer la chose. For a man so devoted to her as you are, you have certainly contrived to outrage and injure her in the most complete manner. Mon beau Marquis! to think how fooled we all were all the time by you. How haughty you were, how fastidious, how patrician!'
He leaned against the high column of the enamelled stove and covered his eyes with his hands. He was unnerved, unstrung, half-paralysed. The blow had fallen on him without preparation or defence being possible to him. His thoughts were all in confusion; one thing alone he knew—he, and all he loved, were in the power of a merciless woman, who would no more spare them than the sloughi astride the antelope will let go its quivering flesh.