To save
herself, she caught at my doublet, which was torn open under the
strain.
We stood some few feet apart, and, white and palpitating in her
anger, she confronted me. Her eyes lashed me with their scorn, but
under my steady, unflinching gaze they fell at last. When next she
raised them there was a smile of quiet but unutterable contempt
upon her lips.
"Will you swear," said she, "that you are not Rene de Lesperon?
That Mademoiselle de Marsac is not your betrothed?"
"Yes - by my every hope of Heaven!" I cried passionately.
She continued to survey me with that quiet smile of mocking scorn.
"I have heard it said," quoth she, "that the greatest liars are ever
those that are readiest to take oath." Then, with a sudden gasp of
loathing, "I think you have dropped something, monsieur," said she,
pointing to the ground. And without waiting for more, she swung
round and left me.
Face upwards at my feet lay the miniature that poor Lesperon had
entrusted to me in his dying moments. It had dropped from my doublet
in the struggle, and I never doubted now but that the picture it
contained was that of Mademoiselle de Marsac.
CHAPTER IX
A NIGHT ALARM
I was returning that same afternoon from a long walk that I had
taken - for my mood was of that unenviable sort that impels a man
to be moving - when I found a travelling-chaise drawn up in the
quadrangle as if ready for a journey. As I mounted the steps of
the chateau I came face to face with mademoiselle, descending.
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