She sat silent for a moment or two. "It's no good," she said, looking over to him with a forlorn smile. He moved his hand impatiently. "Very well. At dinner at Ashwood, on the night you were taken ill, somebody talked about the Alethea and said Professor Maturin had told him there was a fatal defect in it. He hadn't seen the prospectus. And I----" She paused a moment. "I had to back up your version." Again she broke off for a moment. "And after dinner Mr. Marchmont talked to me; and I cried about it. So, you see, references are embarrassing." After a pause of a minute or two Quisante said, "Cried about it? About what?" She raised her eyes, looked at him a moment, and said simply, "About having to tell a lie to them." And she added with a sudden quiver in her voice, "I've known them all my life." "Maturin was quite wrong. There's absolutely no doubt about that now." "Was he?" she asked listlessly. "What did you say?" "That he'd expressed a favourable opinion about it to you. I kept to the prospectus. Oh, there's no use talking. It's only with Mr. Marchmont that it matters. I can't keep it up before him, because he found me crying, you know." "Crying!" murmured Quisante. "Crying!" She nodded at him, with the same faint smile on her lips. The silence seemed very long as she looked at him and he gazed straight before him, the forgotten paper falling with a rustle from his knees on to the floor. "You never told me," he said at last. "Why should I? What was the good of telling you?" "It was on the night of my--when I was taken ill?" "Yes. The telegram came later in the evening. Don't bother about it now, Alexander." "Did you hope it meant I was dead?" For a moment she sat still; then she sprang up, ran across the room, and fell on her knees before him, grasping his arms in her hands. "No, no, no, I didn't. Indeed, indeed, I didn't." He sat still in her clasp, looking intently in her face. His was hard and sneering. "Yes, you did. You wished me dead. By God, you wish me dead now. Well, you can wait a little. I shall be dead soon." With a sudden rough movement he freed himself from her hands and pushed her away. "I suppose wives often wish their husbands dead, but they don't tell them so quite so plainly." "It's not true, I've never told you so." "Oh, I'm not a fool. I don't need to have it spelt out for me in syllables."