"All right, if you think prevarication more honourable than lying straight out," panted Juliet, holding down sobs. "But you won't do her any good with me--or yourself either. You were scared _blue_ when I said the eye of the clasp looked to the right instead of to the left, like the eye on your seal ring. You'd hardly believe it till you _had_ to. Then the whole thing grew clear to you, as it's growing for me now. This copy existed. The clasp was made the wrong way, by mistake or on purpose. As soon as I spoke, you _knew_ what had happened. Your first thought--as soon as you could think--was to save that woman. But you shan't save her! I----" "Do you intend to make a scandal of this beastly business?" the Duke cut her short with violence. "If you do, you will repent it all your life." Juliet quivered. "I don't care about my life now," she said. "You've spoilt it. You couldn't punish me any more than you've punished me already--for loving and trusting you. So it doesn't matter what I----" "It matters immensely," he broke in again. "You are cruel to yourself--to me--to a woman who has _never_ injured you. When I say that you'll repent making a scandal, I don't mean because I'd try to 'punish' you. My God, no! You'll repent because you will be doing a great injustice which can't possibly be repaired. And at heart, when you're true to yourself, you are just." "It's no use your trying to appeal to my sense of justice," Juliet warned him. "That's the last thing for _you_ to bring up!" He looked at her very sadly, very strangely, it seemed to his wife, as if anger were dying out, and a great sorrow had taken its place. But that was only his cleverness--his deadly, Irish cleverness, of course! "What, then, do you intend to do?" he asked. Once more confusion fogged the girl's brain, a desolate confusion like chaos after ordered beauty; the end of all joy, all loveliness. "I don't know yet," she said, dully. "I shall have to think." As Juliet spoke, fingers tapped lightly on the door: Simone's fingers, no doubt. Her fifteen minutes of banishment had passed. "Come in!" Juliet spoke mechanically; and if she wished to withdraw the words, it was too late. The Frenchwoman opened the door. "_Madame la Duchesse_ is ready for me to finish dressing her?" she asked. Vaguely it struck Juliet that Simone's voice was not quite natural. She had probably been listening at the keyhole, and had heard everything. But, on second thoughts, what _did_ it matter? Juliet told herself miserably that nothing could be the same as it had been. She could not go on after this, living with Pat as his wife. All the world would soon know that there was trouble between them, and Simone's knowing first was of little importance. She was only a servant, and luckily a loyal and discreet servant.