For a moment she looked at him without speaking, eager to resent the implied imputation on her husband, yet unwilling to give the slanderer the satisfaction of seeing that his thrust had carried home. Concealing as best she could her growing irritation, she said calmly: "Don't you suppose _he_ also is faithful to me?" Again that horrible, cynical smile. Fixing her with his piercing dark eyes, and, in a manner, the significance of which could not escape her, he said: "Don't seek to know too much, Madam. To paraphrase a famous saying: 'It's a wise woman who knows her own husband.'" Coloring with anger, she said: "You mean----" "Just what I say--that a woman, a wife cannot possibly be sure of her husband's fidelity. Think how different are the conditions. The wife, no matter if her temperament be warm or cold, is always at home, surrounded by prying eyes, rarely beset by temptation. The husband is often away, he goes on business journeys that free him temporarily from the chains which keep him in good behavior. If he is good looking, the women look at him, flirt with him. It is inevitable. The chances are that he succumbs to the first adventure--no matter how exemplary a husband he may be at home. If he is a man--of unusual character, he passes through the fire unscathed; if he is--just a man, he is attracted to the candle like the proverbial moth and sometimes singes his wings----" She looked at him keenly for a moment as if trying to read on his sphinx-like face if he knew more about Kenneth than he admitted, and then with forced calmness she said: "In your opinion, Signor Keralio--is my husband a man--of unusual character, or is he--just a man?" The Italian shrugged his shoulders as he replied deprecatingly: "My dear madam, just stop and think a moment. Isn't that a rather indiscreet question to put to a man--a man who is a friend of your husband----" Hotly she turned on him. "If you are his friend, why do you vilify and slander him behind his back?" Keralio lifted up his long slender hands in pious protest. "I vilify--my best friend---- Oh, my dear Mrs. Traynor--you have quite misunderstood me. I am a foreigner. Perhaps it is that I express myself ill." She shook her head skeptically. Firmly she said: "No, Signor Keralio--you express yourself quite plainly. Now, I'll be equally frank with you. I confess there is one thing I do not understand. I have never understood it. I do not understand why my husband, a man so honorable, so straightforward in his dealings, a man so free from intrigue or reckless adventures, so regular, methodical and temperate in his habits, a man so entirely apart from the reckless, immoral kind of life you hint at, should have made a friend of _you_----" The Italian raised his eyebrows, but there was only an amused smile on his bloodless lips as he said with a mock bow: "Thank you, madam. You are very flattering."