“Hang it! You don’t seem to be quite yourself,” he went on, in the same jeering tone. “Would you like a little glass of liquor to buck you up? I quite understand that you’re very much upset and I admit that I should not like to be in your place--all your little play-fellows gone--no help possible for quite a while--securely shut up in this room with a gentleman named Ralph. It certainly is not a time to see the world in rose-color. Unlucky Josephine. What a mess you have made of it!” He stooped down and picked up the photograph of Clarice: “How pretty my fiancée is, isn’t she? It gave me the greatest pleasure to see how you were admiring her just now. You know that we’re going to get married in a few days?” “She’s dead,” said Josephine. “As a matter of fact, I heard about that,” he said calmly. “Your little friend who was here just now stabbed her in her bed, didn’t he?” “Yes.” “With a dagger, wasn’t it?” “Three times--through the heart,” she said. “Once ought to have been enough, you know,” he suggested. She said slowly, as if striving to assure herself of the fact: “She’s dead. She’s dead.” He chuckled: “What can you expect? It happens every day. But you can’t expect me to change all my plans for a little thing like that. Dead or alive, I’m going to marry her. And we must manage as best we can. _You_ managed splendidly.” “What do you mean?” said Josephine sharply, beginning to grow yet more uneasy at his careless bantering tone. “What do I mean? Why look at you. First of all the Baron drowned you, next you were blown up and then drowned in the wreck of your vessel the _Glow-worm_. But all that drowning doesn’t prevent you from being here. Therefore the fact that Clarice has been stabbed through the heart three times is no reason for my not marrying her. Besides are you quite sure that your statement is accurate?” “One of my own men stabbed her,” she said. “Or at any rate he told you that he’d stabbed her.” “Why should he have lied?” “Why, to get hold of the ten bank-notes you handed over to him.” “Dominique is incapable of betraying me! He would not betray me for a hundred thousand francs! Besides he knows quite well that I can lay hands on him. He’s waiting for me with the others,” she said fiercely. “Are you quite sure that he’s waiting for you, Josine?” said Ralph; and the jeering note in his voice was louder. She shivered. She had a feeling that she was struggling in a narrowing circle.