She crouched by the empty chair, her head dropping on her outstretched arms. She seemed to be sobbing.
He paused by the door. Something forlorn in her attitude touched him.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “If I were mad for love of you, I would do anything you asked me, but ... I’m not. I can’t go with you because I don’t care for you in that way. I realize it now. Perhaps I should have known it sooner. Please forgive me.”
She rose and faced him.
“Forgive you.... You poor fool! Did you think I meant it? Why, I was only acting. Did you think I cared for you? It’s only money I care for, money, money. I offered myself to you and you refused me. You are the only man who ever did that. It’s that that hurts. You’ve wounded me in a way time will never heal. I hate you, hate you! Oh, I could kill you. Go!...”
She pointed to the door, then turning, once again dropped beside the chair. She was really crying now, shaken with great rending sobs.
He left her. As he passed in front of the dark Casino, the pinkish face of the clock showed it to be one in the morning. All the way downhill to the Condamine he did not meet a soul. There was no moon; and the quietness was almost eerie.
The passage leading to the house was as dark as a tunnel of anthracite. He plunged into its blackness, then stopped short. A man was blocking his way. Instinctively his hand went to his hip pocket for his automatic. Assassins....
Then a second man, darting from behind, gripped his arms. He struggled madly; but the first man, closing in, struck at him with something hard, and he remembered no more.