"That is not the question," he replies, in a voice so exceedingly stern, so absolutely different from any thing I have ever hitherto contemplated as possible in my gentle, genial Roger, that again, to the depths of my soul, I quail; how could I ever, in wildest dreams, have thought I should dare to tell him?--"it is nothing to me what tales _you_ can tell of _her_!--_she_ is not my wife!--what I wish to know--what I _will_ know, is, whether there is any thing that she _could_ say of you!" For a moment, I do not answer. I cannot. A coward fear is grasping my heart with its clammy hands. Then-- "_Could!_" say I, shrugging my shoulders, and feebly trying to laugh derisively; "of course she could! it would be difficult to set a limit to the powers of a lady of her imagination!" "What do you mean?" he cries, quickly, and with what sounds like a sort of hope in his voice; "have you any reason--any grounds for thinking her inventive?" I do not answer directly. "It is true, then," I cry, with flashing eyes, and in a voice of great and indignant anguish. "I have not been mistaken! I was right! Is it possible that _you_, who, only this morning, warned me with such severity against backbiting, have been calmly listening to scandalous tales about me from a stranger?" He does not interrupt me: he is listening eagerly, and that sort of hope is still in his face. "I _knew_ it would come, sooner or later," I continue, speaking excitedly, and with intense bitterness, "sooner or later, I knew that it would be a case of Algy over again! but I did not--did not think that it would have been quite so soon! Great Heaven!" (smiting my hands sharply together, and looking upward), "I _have_ fallen low! to think that I should come to be discussed by _you_ with _her_!" "I have _not_ discussed you with her," he answers, very solemnly, and still looking at me with that profound and greedy eagerness in his eyes; "with _no_ living soul would I discuss my wife--I should have hardly thought I need tell you that! What I heard, I heard by accident. She--as I believe, in all innocence of heart--referred to--the--the--circumstance, taking it for granted that I knew it--that _you_ had told me of it, and I--_I_--" (raising his clinched right hand to emphasize his speech)--"I take God to witness, I had no more idea to what she was alluding--as soon as I understood--she must have thought me very dull--" (laughing hoarsely)--"for it was a long time before I took it in--but as soon as I understood to what manner of anecdote it was that she was referring--then, _at once_, I bade her be silent!--not even with _her_, would I talk over my wife!" He stops. He has risen from his chair, and is now standing before me. His breath comes quick and panting; and his face is not far from being as white as mine.