“Honour!” sneered the other in a voice quivering with suppressed passion. “Honour! Are clandestine meetings consistent with the honour of an English gentleman? You meet—” He looked cautiously round as he spoke—“Let her be nameless, for who knows what ears may be within hearing? You meet her secretly at midnight in the Michaelovski Palace; you meet her with kisses and embraces at this masquerade; you are seen leaving her bed-chamber in the inn at Gora. You, who have brought shame upon her—do you talk of honour?” Through the holes of his mask the man’s eyes glowed like fire; a great rage seemed to hold him. He fingered his sword-hilt, as if longing to hurl himself upon Wilfrid and end his life there and then, without troubling to wait for the morning. As for Wilfrid, the words of the other fell upon him with the shock of a thunderbolt, filling him with a dreadful dismay, not so much on his own account as on Marie’s. What had hitherto been a haunting suspicion was now converted to a black truth; the bed-chamber incident was known to Ouvaroff, might be known to others! All innocent as the Princess was, the finger of scorn would now be pointed to her as one fallen from maidenly purity. And the bitterest thought of all was there seemed no way of refuting the slander. Vain would it be for him or for her to deny. The mocking nobility, reared in the tainted atmosphere of Catharine’s Court, and accustomed to measure others by their own standard, would accept as true neither his word nor that of the Princess. She was branded with the mark of shame, and the cause of it all was himself—Wilfrid Courtenay! Well, he could have one satisfaction at least, the satisfaction of seeing the original traducer fall dead at his feet, for he would give him no quarter in the morning. “The fight cannot come too soon,” he said, between his set teeth. “You have cast a black slander on an innocent lady, and by Heaven! you die for it.” “Innocent! Am I to take the kisses and embraces of to-night as proofs of innocence?” “Why should _not_ the lady kiss me if she choose?” The other drew a breath as of amazement, and for a few moments stared, as if he doubted whether there were not something wrong with Wilfrid’s mental calibre. “You speak thus, knowing who the lady is?” “Your pardon, I do not know who the lady is. I am under no obligation to offer explanations to you, sir, but thus much may be tendered, that I know the lady only by the name of Princess Marie—a name that conveys no meaning to me.” Wilfrid did not ask the other to enlighten him in any way respecting the Princess; in his present haughty mood he would take no favours from him. The Crusader looked at Wilfrid as if doubting his statement. “Can this be true?” he muttered. “It might not be, were I a Russian prince.” As if confronted with some new and startling problem, the man turned aside and took a few steps to and fro before he spoke again.