“Is that all?” returned Mauleverer, his own mood in harmony with his friend’s. “I didn’t know that any sensible man ever did. I’m sure I don’t.” “Why, what is wrong with you?” asked the other, incredulously. “You haven’t been deceived by the woman you trusted?” “It seems to me we all have,” was the bitter answer. “Don’t you remember what I was telling you about down-stairs?” “Ah, yes; I had forgotten it. You mean that girl? Why, have you just discovered that she really loves another man?” “Not that exactly. She loves me, or she pretends to, but she has sold herself to the other man.” “She doesn’t love you!” The words were pronounced with an emphasis which Mauleverer could not understand, and which was not meant for his ears. “They all pretend, if not in words, in looks and actions. It is their occupation, like politics with us. I knew a woman once who made me think she loved me. She never said so, you understand, but led me on, and laughed at me in her sleeve all the while. Depend upon it, this girl of yours is like her. She has some secret lover in the background, some man whom she has sworn to you that she has never seen.” There were three listeners to that savage outburst--two men and a woman; but only the woman understood. The captain remonstrated. “I don’t think that of her. No; hang it! the girl is straight enough. She doesn’t think me worth deceiving; I am too poor.” “I see. Then it is the other man she is deceiving, and you are the lover in the background. You see, it comes to the same thing. I told you they were all alike.” “It’s not her fault, damn it!” said the loyal Gerald. “She has got to marry the brute; her people have driven her into it.” “Why?” “You needn’t ask. Money. It’s some infernal millionaire like you.” Hammond started. For the first time he turned his attention from the unseen listeners to this dialogue to the man who was speaking to him. “Who? What did you say? Who is this man?” “I don’t know his name; she wouldn’t tell me,” replied the suspicious captain. “What does it matter to me who he is?” “Do I know the girl?” “Yes. I don’t mind telling you, old man; it’s my cousin Victoria.” “What!” The word burst from Hammond like a bullet. His eyes sought the curtain. “Are all women traitors?” he cried. And striding to the curtains, he dragged them back. There in the light of the moon stood the two who had overheard every word. The marquis had his arm round Belle’s neck, and her face was hidden in her father’s breast. “It is true!” gasped Hammond. A tremendous silence followed. How long it lasted none of the four could tell. At length the marquis broke it. “Well, sir?” he said, looking Hammond full in the face with a certain dignity for which the other had not been prepared. “I beg your pardon, marquis. I was told that you and this lady were strangers, and I believed it, like a fool.”