“I found this in your pocket-book,” she said. “I could hardly believe that you carried about with you another woman’s photograph. Who is it?” It was the photograph of Clarice d’Etigues. He hesitated, then said: “I don’t know. It’s a photo I picked up.” “Come: don’t lie!” she said brusquely. “It’s Clarice d’Etigues. Do you suppose I’ve never seen her? You were in love with her.” “No! Never!” he said firmly. “You _were_ in love with her, and she with you. I’m certain of it. And it is still going on.” He shrugged his shoulders, but as he was about to defend the young girl, Josephine broke in: “I don’t want to hear anything more about it. You’re warned, and it’s just as well. I’m not going out of my way to look for her, but if she ever crosses my path--all the worse for her.” “And all the worse for you, if you touch a hair of her head!” he exclaimed imprudently. She paled. Her lips quivered, and laying her hand on his neck, she stammered: “You dare to take her part against me ... against me!” Her hand, very cold, contracted. He had the impression that she was going to strangle him and sprang out of bed. In her turn she was alarmed, thinking that he was going to strike her, and snatched from her bodice a little dagger with gleaming blade. In these attitudes of attack they stared into one another’s eyes, and it was so painful that Ralph murmured: “Oh, Josine, what a pity it is that it should have come to this!” No less moved, she sank into a chair, and he threw himself at her feet. “Kiss me, Ralph--kiss me--and don’t let’s think anything more about it!” she murmured in a broken voice. They clasped one another in a feverish embrace. But he observed that she still held the poniard, and a very slight movement would have driven it into his neck. At eight o’clock the next morning he left the _Nonchalante_. “I have nothing to hope from her,” he told himself. “As for love: she loves me indeed, and sincerely; and she wishes, as I do, that this love was without reserves. But it cannot be. She has a hostile soul. She distrusts everything and everybody, and me above all.” At bottom he found her impenetrable. In spite of all his suspicions and, for that matter, of considerable evidence, even though the very spirit of evil dwelt in her, he refused to admit that she would go to the length of actual crime. He could not reconcile the idea of murder with that sweet face, which neither hate nor anger rendered less sweet. No: Josephine’s hands were not stained with blood. But he thought of Leonard and never doubted that he was capable of putting Bridget’s mother to the most terrible torture. * * * * *