"Explain?" she asked. "What is there to explain? He has failed!" Her voice broke in a sob of uncontrollable grief. "I tried to forget, still hoping he was strong—that he would prove himself strong. How I have hoped and prayed—and now!"
She bent over, with her face on the table, in a vain effort to conceal and repress her grief.
Lord James leaned forward, eagerly insistent. "You must listen to me. He has not had fair play. Such a gallant fight as he was making! I believe he would have won, I really believe he would have won, had it not been for that woman."
"What woman?" asked Genevieve, half lifting her head.
"Pardon me," he replied. "But your aunt—It was most uncalled for, most unfair. It seems she sought him out—to-night, of all times!—when he was pegged—completely knocked-up. You have seen that yourself. This was after we deserted him."
"Deserted? Yes, that is the word—deserted!"
"At the moment when he tasted the wine, quite unaware of what he was doing. We deserted him at the time when he had utmost need of us. What clearer proof of his great strength than that he fought off the temptation?"
"Yet now you say—?"
"He fought it off then. He proved himself as strong as even you could desire. When I hastened in I found him still where I am sitting, but doubled over, utterly spent—asleep, poor chap. His hand was bleeding. He had shattered your—he had crushed one of the glasses with his fist."
"Crushed a glass! But why?"