This only confirmed her suspicions--he was angry with her about something. A question rose to her lips: 'Has some one been speaking ill of me?' Her diplomacy, however, got the better of her impetuosity. Is not anxiety to disarm suspicion almost a confession in itself? The really innocent are quite callous. Her best course was to find out what René had been doing himself, and what persons he had seen who might have told him something. 'Did you go and see Mademoiselle Rigaud?' she asked, indifferently. 'Yes,' replied René, unable to disguise his embarrassment at the question. 'And has she forgiven poor Claude?' continued Suzanne. 'No,' he rejoined, adding: 'She is a very bad woman,' and in such a bitter tone that Madame Moraines at once guessed part of the truth. The actress must certainly have spoken of her to René. She was again seized with a desire to provoke his confidence, and reflected that the surest means of attaining her object was by intoxicating her lover with passion. She knew how powerless he would be to resist the emotions her caresses would let loose, and at once sealed his lips with a long kiss. By the silent and frenzied ardour with which he returned it Suzanne understood not only that René had suffered, but that she had, to a great extent, been the cause. In her sweetest voice, and in tones best calculated to reach that heart which had always been open to her, she said, 'What is this trouble that you won't tell me?' Had she uttered those words at the beginning of their interview he would not have been able to resist them. Amidst tears and kisses, he would have repeated what Colette had said! But alas! it was no longer Colette's words that caused him his present sufferings. What now gave him frightful pain and pierced his heart like a dagger was the fact of having caught her, his idol, in a deliberate lie. Yes, she had lied; this time there was no doubt about it. She had told him that she had been to the theatre with her husband only, and that was false; that she had been sad, and that was false too. Could he reply to her question, which betrayed affectionate concern, by two such clear, explicit, and irrefutable charges? He had not the courage to do it, and got out of the dilemma by repeating his former reply. Suzanne looked at him, and he was obliged to turn his head. She only sighed and said, 'Poor René!' and, as it was almost time for her to go, she pushed her inquiries no further.