"This means that I ought to have hated you and all your circle; but I have fallen in love with you. This means that for your sake I have degraded myself in my own conscience; for this cause I shall mete out my own punishment to myself. But precisely for this reason I have nothing to lose, and you must pay me for my iniquity, otherwise there will be a catastrophe!" Pani Elzen was not frightened, for in general she had no fear of men. She did not fear Kresovich's consumption either, since the local physician had quieted her perfectly on that point. Her astonishment alone was real; anger and fear were merely apparent. Amazement sprang up in her heart at once, "But he is a bird of prey, ready to tear me to pieces." For her nature, wrapped up as it was in corruption and fond of novelty, every adventure, especially when it flattered her female vanity, had an unspeakable charm. For this cause her moral sense was astonished at nothing. If Kresovich had implored her for one moment of delight, for the right to kiss the hem of her garment with humility, and on his knees, she would have given command to throw him out of doors. But this man, terrible, almost wild, this representative of a sect of whose tremendous energy fabulous tales were related in her social circle, seemed demonic, so different from all men whom she had seen up to that time that she was seized with ecstasy. Her nerves were greedy of novelty. She thought, too, that in case of resistance, the adventure might take on proportions altogether unforeseen, and turn into a scandal; for that lunatic was really ready for anything. But Kresovich continued, covering her face with his burning breath,-- "I love, and I have nothing to lose. I have lost health, I have destroyed my future, and have demeaned myself!--I have nothing to lose! Do you understand? To me it is all one whether at your call ten men run in here or a hundred; for you it is not all one! Afterward I shall go; and the secret will be lost--I swear!" Pani Elzen cared only for preserving appearances, which the hypocritical woman always tries to preserve and to deceive herself. Turning her eyes, filled with feigned terror, to his face, which was really like the face of a madman, she asked,-- "Do you want to kill me?" "I want pay--not in money!" answered he, in a stifled voice. Then growing paler yet, he seized her in his arms; and she began to defend herself. But she did so like a fainting woman whom terror deprives of strength and consciousness. CHAPTER V. Svirski, on arriving at Villa Franca, got out and went to the harbor; for it occurred to him that he might return to Nice by boat. He found, just at the edge of the harbor, a fisherman, an old acquaintance, who, pleased at the sight of a liberal customer, undertook with usual Ligurian boastfulness to take him "even to Corsica though the Sirocco were to turn the sea bottom upward."