Madame Nestor regarded the other steadily, until all distortion of feature had given away to her accustomed mildness. Then she uttered an unforgettable question:
"Can a tiger eat grains?"
Vast ranges of terrible understanding were suggested.
"It is my duty, if I ever had a duty," the caller went on, "to make you know Bellingham as I know him. You must have no pity."
"Is there really no fact by which his age can be determined?"
"None that I know. Twenty-five years ago, when he left me hideously wise and pitifully drained, he looked as he does now."
"But why, oh why, do you always think of me with Bellingham?" Paula asked hopelessly.
"I watched his face when he regarded you last night. I knew the look."
"What is to prevent me from never seeing him? He cannot force himself upon me here—in the flesh.... Certainly you would not tell him where I am, where I go—if I begged you not to!"
Madame Nestor shuddered. "No, Paula. It is because you are frightened and tormented that such a thought comes. It is I who am showing you the real Bellingham. He menaces my race. None but big-souled women are useful to him now. He is drawn to them, as one hungry, as one always hungry. It is he first who is drawn. Then they begin to feel and respond to his occult attraction. The time might have come when you would worship him—had I not warned you. I did. I was quite his—until I learned. A woman knows no laws in the midst of an attraction like this. No other man suffices——"