“Well?” she said, in rather a hard voice.
“Madame, I don’t know what I thought, what I think—only I cannot bear that you should apologise for any conduct of mine. Indeed, I cannot bear it.”
He looked fearfully excited and moved two or three steps away, then returned.
“Were you doing that?” he asked. “Were you, Madame?”
“I never mentioned your name to Father Roubier, nor did he to me,” she answered.
For a moment he looked relieved, then a sudden suspicion seemed to strike him.
“But without mentioning my name?” he said.
“You wish to accuse me of quibbling, of insincerity, then!” she exclaimed with a heat almost equal to his own.
“No, Madame, no! Madame, I—I have suffered much. I am suspicious of everybody. Forgive me, forgive me!”
He spoke almost with distraction. In his manner there was something desperate.