“Very well,” she answered quickly, with a little undue eagerness, I thought. Then, fixing me again with her eyes, she said: “Once you gave yourself to me body and soul and implored me to love you. But I spurned you—not because I entertained any affection for you, but for the sake of the one woman who loved you—Muriel Moore.”
“Then you knew Muriel?” I interrupted quickly, in an endeavour to at least clear up that single fact.
“No,” she answered, “I did not know her. A reader of the heart, I was, however, aware that she was madly enamoured of you, therefore I was frank enough to urge you to reciprocate her love, and thus obtain felicity. Well, she has hidden herself from you, but you shall find her on one condition—namely, that you render yourself passive in my hands—that you give yourself entirely to me.”
“What do you mean?” I gasped, holding back instinctively and glaring at her. “Are you the Devil himself that you should make this proposal which in the mediaeval legend Mephistopheles made to Faust?”
“My intentions are of no concern,” she responded, in a strange voice like one speaking afar off. “Will you, or will you not accept my conditions?”
“But to give myself to you when I love another is impossible!” I protested.
“I make this demand not in any spirit of coquetry,” she replied. “That you should be mine, body and soul, is necessary, in order that you should preserve the silence which is imperative.”
“To put it plainly you desire, in return for the service you will render me, that I should utter no word to your lover of my suspicions?” I said, gradually grasping her meaning.
Again the glint of evil seemed to shine from those blue eyes, which changed their hue with every humour.
“Exactly,” she answered, her slim fingers nervously twisting the golden chain of her lorgnette. “But you must become mine, to do as I bid and act entirely as I direct,” she declared. “Unless you give me your word of honour to do this there can be no agreement between us. Remember that your silence will be for our mutual benefit, for I shall remain happy while you will gain the woman you love.”