The permission was accorded. As he crossed the room he stopped near his wife, and said, confusedly, in a very low tone:
“I have done you many injuries, but I never intended this. I am sorry for it. Have you anything to say to me before I go?”
My mistress shuddered and hid her face. He waited a moment, and, finding that she did not answer him, bowed his head politely and went out. I did not know it then, but I had seen him for the last time.
After he had gone, the lawyer, addressing Mr. Robert Nicholson, said that he had an application to make in reference to the woman Josephine Durand.
At the mention of that name my mistress hurriedly whispered a few words into her relation’s ear. He looked toward Mr. Philip Nicholson, who immediately advanced, offered his arm to my mistress, and led her out. I was about to follow, when Mr. Dark stopped me, and begged that I would wait a few minutes longer, in order to give myself the pleasure of seeing “the end of the case.”
In the meantime, the justice had pronounced the necessary order to have the quadroon brought back. She came in, as bold and confident as ever. Mr. Robert Nicholson looked away from her in disgust and said to the lawyer:
“Your application is to have her committed for perjury, of course?”
“For perjury?” said Josephine, with her wicked smile. “Very good. I shall explain some little matters that I have not explained before. You think I am quite at your mercy now? Bah! I shall make myself a thorn in your sides yet.”
“She has got scent of the second marriage,” whispered Mr. Dark to me.
There could be no doubt of it. She had evidently been listening at the door on the night when my master came back longer than I had supposed. She must have heard those words about “the new wife”—she might even have seen the effect of them on Mr. James Smith.