“Give me that letter,” she said with a swift flash of command. “It belongs to me.”
“Pardon,” he answered, quietly, “yesterday the Comte des Forges was killed by a friend of his whose honour he had betrayed. The letter belongs to the lady to whom it was written, the lady who will be the Vicomtesse de Nérac.”
A faint cry escaped from Denise’s lips. For the moment she leaned faint against the chimney-piece, white and sick.
André looked at her, but he made no effort to offer her either sympathy or help. Then he walked back, Denise watching him, and flung the letter into the fire. Denise started, but she said nothing, though her great grey eyes were eloquent with half a dozen questions.
“The letter has served its purpose,” André said. “Adieu, Marquise!”
“What does this—this trickery mean?” she demanded, hotly.
“You must forgive one who loves you,” was the calm reply, “for love laughs at tricks. The Comte des Forges is alive and well: he has a wound in his shoulder which is only a scratch, for the poor Comte is always believing that some one is betraying his honour and Madame the Comtesse has a fickle heart. Yesterday I was his second, so I know.”
“Then—then—” she cried and stopped.
André bowed most courteously. “You refused to believe me, Mademoiselle: I returned the compliment and refused to believe you—and I proved it by a lover’s trick, if you choose to call it such. That is all, but it is enough.”
“Ah!” She crumpled up the fan in speechless indignation.