"Then what shall you do?"
"Give her one," the astrologer answered. The enigmatical smile, which had been all along playing on his face, grew deeper, keener, more cruel. His eyes gleamed with triumph--and evil. "I shall give her one," he said again.
"But--what will she do with it?" M. de Vidoche muttered.
"Take it! You fool, cannot you understand?" the man in black answered sharply. "Give me back the powders. I shall give them to her. She will take them--herself. You will be saved--all!"
M. de Vidoche reeled. "My God!" he cried. "I think you are the devil!"
"Perhaps," the man in black answered "but give me the powders."
CHAPTER VI.
[THE POWDER OF ATTRACTION.]
Meanwhile, a few yards away, in the room of the astrolabe, Madame de Vidoche sat, waiting and trembling, afraid to move from the spot where the astrologer had placed her, and longing for his return. The minutes seemed endless, the house a grave. The silence and mystery which wrapped her round, the sombre hangings, the burning candles, the cabalistic figures filled her with awe and apprehension. She was a timid woman; nothing but that last and fiercest hunger of all, the hunger for love, could have driven her to this desperate step or brought her here. But she was here, it had brought her; and though fear blanched her cheek, and her limbs shook under her, and she dared not pray--for what was this she was doing?--she did not repent, or wish the step untaken, or go back on her desire.
The place was dreadful to her; but not so dreadful as the cold home, the harsh words, the mockery of love, the slowly growing knowledge that there never had been love, from which she was here to escape. She was alone, but not more lonely than she had been for months in her own house. The man who daily met her with gibes and taunts, and seldom spoke without reminding her how pale and colourless she showed beside the florid witty beauties of the Court--his friends--was still her all, and had been her idol. If he failed her, the world was empty indeed. Only one thing remained therefore; by hook or crook, by all a woman might do or dare, by submission, by courage, to win back his love. She had tried. God knows she had tried! She had knelt to him, and he had struck her. She had dressed and been gay, and striven to jest as his friends jested: he had scourged her with a cutting sneer. She had prayed, and Heaven had not answered. She had turned from Heaven--a white-faced, pining woman, little more than a girl--and she was here.