“Well, have I beaten you? Have madam’s shoulders touched the mat? Are you knocked out? Defeat all along the line. What? That’s what I wanted to bring home to you, Josephine. You will go away from here completely convinced that you can do nothing against me and that it is best to give up all idea of plotting against me. I shall be happy in spite of you, and so will Clarice, and we shall have lots and lots of children. So you will have to make up your mind to face these facts.” He began to walk up and down and went on in accents that grew more and more cheerful: “Moreover what would you? You struck a streak of bad luck when you went to war with a stout young fellow who is ten times as strong and smart as you, my poor girl. I’m often astonished myself at my strength and smartness. Heavens! What a marvel of cleverness, cunning, intuition, energy, and clearsightedness! A veritable genius! Nothing escapes me. I read the minds of my enemies like an open book. Their slightest thoughts are known to me. So, at this very moment you’ve got your back to me, haven’t you? You’re spread out on the bed and I cannot see your charming face. All the same I’m perfectly well aware that you’re slipping your hand into your bodice and pulling out a revolver and that you’re going----” The sentence was not finished. Suddenly Josephine twisted round, revolver in hand. The report rang out. But Ralph, who was ready had time to grasp her wrist and twist it back--towards herself. She fell back wounded in the bosom. The scene had been so brutal and the dénouement so unexpected that he stood speechless before this suddenly inert form which lay before him, the face colorless. However he felt no anxiety. He did not believe that she was dead; and as a matter of fact, when he bent down and looked into it, he found that her heart was beating steadily. He cut away the top of her bodice with his nail-scissors. The bullet, striking aslant, had glanced off after ploughing through the flesh, a little above the black mark on top of her breast. “It isn’t a serious wound,” he said to himself, thinking that the death of such a creature would have been only right and desirable. He stood over her, still holding the scissors in his hand, and asking himself if it was not his duty to destroy this too perfect beauty, to mangle that charming face and so to rob the siren of her power to injure. A scar in the shape of a deep cross across her face, which raised ridges of skin would render indelible, what a just punishment and what a valuable precaution! What evil deeds avoided and what crimes prevented! He had not the courage to do so; he did not wish to arrogate to himself the right to do so. Besides he had loved her too well.