"You are a brave woman." Then as I did not quail before her passion, drew up her slight figure to its height and said: "We are worthy of each other, you and I. Tell me what you want." Then I felt my own cheek turn pale, and I was fain to sit upon the pile of cushions that were arranged in one corner for a seat. "What I want?" I repeated. "I want to know how you dared put in language the insinuations which you hung up on the door of the old mill this morning?" Her eyes, narrowed, as I have said, in her seemingly habitual desire to keep their secrets to herself, flashed wide open at this, while a low and mirthless laugh escaped her lips. "So my labor was not entirely wasted!" she cried. "You saw--" "Both the lines and the writer," I completed, relentlessly preserving the advantage I felt myself to have gained--"the lines before they were defaced by the storm, the writer as she picked up the useless paper and went away." "So!" she commented, with another echo of that joyless laughter; "there are two spies instead of one in this game!" "There are two women instead of one who know your enmity and purpose," I retorted. "How came you at the mill?" she suddenly asked, after a moment of silent communion with her own repressed soul. "By accident," was all my reply. "Were you alone?" "I was." "Then no one but yourself saw the paper?" "No one but myself." She gave me a look I made no sign of understanding. "Have you told any one of what you saw and read?" she inquired at last, as she perceived I meant to volunteer nothing. "That I am not called upon to state," I returned. "Oh, you would play the lawyer!" was her icy and quiet remark. "I would _play_ nothing," was the answer that came from my lips. She drew back, and a change passed over her. Slowly as a fire is kindled, the passion grew and grew on her face. When it was at its height she leaned her two hands on a table that stood between us, and, bending forward, whispered: "Do you love him? Are you going to fight to keep his name free from stain and his position unassailed before the world?" Believe me if you can, but I could not answer; possibly because I had as yet no answer to the question in my soul. She took advantage of my hesitation. "Perhaps you think it is not worth while to fight me; that I have no real weapons at my command?" and her eyes shot forth a flame that devoured my rising hopes and seared my heart as with a fiery steel. "I think you are a cruel woman," I declared, "anxious to destroy what no longer gives you pleasure." "You know my story then?" she whispered. "He has talked about me, and to you?" "No," I replied, in quiet disdain. "I know nothing save what your own eyes and your conduct tell me." "Then you shall," she murmured, after a moment's scrutiny of my face. "You shall hear how I have been loved, and how I have been forsaken. Perhaps it will help you to appreciate the man who is likely to wreck both our lives."