She held her breath, staring straight into his eyes.
"I—I don't understand you!" she stammered. "You are here to torment—to persecute me!"
"I asked you a question, Enid, but in response you told me a deliberate lie. Think—recall that circumstance, and tell me the truth," he said very quietly.
She was silent for a moment. Then, with her mouth drawn to hardness, she replied: "Yes, it is true—I lied to you, just as you have lied to me. Remember what you told me that moonlit night when we walked by the sea towards the Grotto of Love. I was a fool to have believed in you—to have trusted you as I did! You left me, and, though I wrote time after time to your club, you refused to send me a single line."
"Because—because, Enid, I dared not," replied her companion.
"Why not?" she demanded quickly. "You told me that you loved me, yet—yet your own actions have shown that you lied to me!"
"No," he protested in a low, earnest, hoarse voice; "I told you the truth, Enid, but——"
"But what?" she interrupted in quickly earnestness.
"Well," he replied after a brief pause, "the fact is that I am compelled to wear a mask, even to you, the woman I love. I cannot tell you the truth—I cannot, dearest, for your own sake."
"And you expect me to believe this lame story—eh?" she laughed. She was pale and fragile, yet she seemed to expand and to dilate with force and energy.