“He is in Scotland for a fortnight—but I know everything. I know that you have insulted and defamed me.” She spoke in a low voice and so calmly that he looked at her as if he thought she did not understand the meaning of her own words. “Till I met you,” she went on, “I bore an unsullied name and reputation.” “What have I done to your name and reputation?” he asked, and closed his lips as though he were almost stupefied with silence. But he went a step towards her, with a shrinking, defensive movement. She retreated towards the table on which the candle stood, a flickering witness of the scene between them—a scene full of shame and suffering and unconfessed fear for her, and of cruelty and loathing and bewilderment for him; but for both strangely destitute of fire and passion. “You have ruined both,” she said. “You have dared to make a pretence of marriage with me, though you were married already to an inferior person whom you had known at your lodgings.” “Who told you this?” “I shall not tell you my informant, but I know everything. You will retire from my presence this evening and never enter it again.” “It is not true,” he said shortly, and made another step towards her, and again she retreated. “It is true. To-morrow I shall go to Liphook and expose your infamous behaviour.” “If you dare,” he said, almost fiercely, and then, suddenly, he changed his note. “I was obliged to do it, Anne,” he added, as if he had suddenly seen that the game was up, and lying would serve him nothing. “But I was fond of you; I told you there were many difficulties the night I asked you to marry me.” “No, Alfred”—and for the first time her lips quivered—“you were not fond of me, even then. You were under the impression that you would get the money Sir William Rammage had left me in his will.” “What should I know about his will?” “You were aware of its contents. You went to him in regard to the instructions. I have heard everything from his own lips.” He was silent for a moment, and still there was no expression in his dull eyes. “Rammage could not tell you that I was married,” he said presently. “Where did you get that ridiculous story from?” “It is not a ridiculous story. You have married a common dressmaker, and you presumed after that to insult and impose on me.” “What are you going to do—what do you want me to do?” he asked, almost curiously. “I shall not treat you with the severity you deserve, but you will leave this house to-night and never enter it again.” “I should go to Liphook. You would not like that, Anne.” “Alfred,” she said indignantly, “I could not accept shame and degradation, even from a man I love. Besides, I have no longer any love for you. You will not dare to offer me that. Every moment that you stay in my presence is an insult. I must insist on your leaving this house at once.” “Where am I to go?” he asked, still curiously. “That is for your consideration. You and I are apart.”