"I heard enough, and too much," replied Fatello, with a savage scowl at his interlocutor. "This is idle talk, mere gain of time. Baron Steinfeld!" cried the banker, in a voice that again rose high above its usual pitch, "you are——"
"Stop!" interrupted Steinfeld, speaking very quickly, but with an extraordinary and commanding calmness, which again had its effect. "Descend not to invective, M. Fatello. There is always time for violence. Hear reason. You are in error, an error easily explained. I certainly saw Madame Fatello at the ball, saw and spoke with her—patience, sir, and hear me! But the domino, of my conversation with whom you heard a part, was not Madame Fatello, but Mademoiselle Gonfalon. You take little interest in the frivolities of a masquerade, and are possibly unaware that the two ladies' dresses were exactly similar. You can have heard our conversation but imperfectly, or you would not have wronged me by this suspicion."
Whilst uttering these last sentences, Steinfeld redoubled the keenness of the scrutiny with which he regarded the banker's uncomely and agitated physiognomy. But although piquing himself, as a former diplomatist, on skill in reading men's thoughts through their faces, he was unable to decipher the expression of Fatello's countenance on receiving this plausible explanation of the error into which he had been led by the sisters' identity of costume. As he proceeded with it, the banker's lips, slightly parting, gave his face an air of stupefied wonderment, in addition to its previously inflamed and angry aspect. When Steinfeld concluded an explanation uttered with every appearance of sincerity and candour, and in that flexible and affable tone which, when he chose to employ it, imparted to his words a peculiarly seductive and persuasive charm, Fatello's lips were again firmly closed, and curled with a curious and inexplicable smile. This faded away; he struck his left hand against his forehead, and remained for some moments plunged in thought, as if he hastily retraced in his memory what he had heard the night before, to see how it tallied with the explanation just given him. Thus, at least, Steinfeld interpreted his manner; and although the Austrian's countenance preserved its serenity, his heart throbbed violently against his ribs during the banker's brief cogitation. The result of this was evidently satisfactory to Fatello, from whose brow, when his hand again dropped by his side, the lowering cloud had disappeared, replaced by affability and regret.
"I see," he said, with better grace than might have been expected from him, and taking a step towards Steinfeld, "that nothing remains for me but to implore your pardon, baron, for my unwarrantable suspicions, and for the harsh and unbecoming expressions into which they betrayed me. Jealousy is an evil counsellor, and blinds to the simplest truths. I scarce dare hope you will forgive my intemperate conduct, without exacting the hostile meeting for which I was just now as eager as I at present am to avoid it. If you insist, I must not refuse, but I give you my word that if I have a duel with you to-day, nothing shall induce me to depart from the defensive."
"I should be unreasonable," replied Steinfeld graciously, "if I exacted ampler satisfaction than this handsome apology, for what, after all, was no unnatural misconception. Ten years ago, I might have been more punctilious, but after three or four encounters of the kind, a duel avoided, when its real motive is removed, is a credit to a man's good sense, and no slur upon his courage."
"No one will ever attack yours, my dear baron," said Fatello. "I only hope you will always keep what has passed between us this morning as profound a secret as I, for my own sake, certainly shall do. I am by no means disposed to boast of my part in the affair."
Steinfeld bowed politely, and the two men exchanged, with smiles upon their faces, a cordial grasp of the hand.
"Out of evil cometh good," said the banker sententiously, subsiding upon the silken cushions of a causeuse that extended its arms invitingly at the chimney-corner. "I am delighted to find that the leaden bullet I anticipated exchanging with you is likely to be converted into a golden ring, establishing so near a connexion between us as to render our fighting a duel one of the least probable things in the world. My dear baron, I shall rejoice to call you brother-in-law."
"It would be a great honour for me," replied Steinfeld, "but you over-rate the probability of my enjoying it. Nothing has passed between Mademoiselle Gonfalon and myself to warrant my reckoning on her preference."
"Tush, tush! baron," said Fatello, apparently not heeding, or not noticing the somewhat supercilious turn of Steinfeld's phrases, "you forget the new and not very creditable occupation to which the demons of jealousy and suspicion last night condemned me. You forget that I tracked you in the promenade, and lay in ambush by the fountain, or you would hardly put me off with such tales as these."