_(She takes it mechanically, looks at it, then lets it fall upon the floor. At the same moment the shadow of a man is seen at the window L., and the curtains move slightly.)_ Shall I read the translation to you? _(opens paper with one hand; pushes it off table)_ {Kate.} If you please, _(goes toward lamps)_ _(The movement of the curtain stops. Dor. reads slowly.)_ {Dormer.} _(reading)_ "I was a singer in Brussels, with a sweet voice. They called me La Sirene." {Kate.} _(in a low tone)_ Stop--the Siren. Yes. {Dormer.} _(continuing)_ "I am a Protestant, born at Chaudefontaine, five miles from Liege. My father was an Englishman, my mother a Belgian woman. They died when I was a child." {Kate.} An orphan, like me. _(touches lamp again)_ {Dormer.} _(continuing)_ "Three years ago a student, Eric Thorndyke-- _(Eric appears at L. C., holding back curtain.)_ married me secretly but legally at the Protestant church in the Rue de Stassart in Brussels." Are you listening? {Kate.} Yes. {Dormer.} _(continuing)_ "I married for money and station. I won neither. I found myself wedded to a man who was dependent on a wretched allowance, and who dared not disclose his marriage. We were never happy, and I grew to hate him. One terrible night he discovered me in a gaming house pledging his name to pay my losses. I feared him for the first time in my life, and I fled." {Kate.} Is this--a woman? {Dormer.} _(continuing)_ "The fatigue of my journey threw me into a fever. For many a day I lay at death's door, and throughout the country where the Siren's was a familiar voice I was thought dead." {Kate.} Dead. I see. {Dormer.} _(continuing)_ "When I recovered, my sweet voice and pretty face had gone from me forever. I had nothing but a mad loathing for the man whom I had never loved, and I formed a plan to ruin him." {Kate.} Oh! {Dormer.} _(continuing)_ "I took a new name and fostered the report of my death, saying to myself, 'He will love and marry again, and then I, the wreck of what I have been, will come back to life and destroy his peace,'" _(Eric disappears.)_ {Kate.} Not a woman--not a woman! {Dormer.} _(continuing)_ "But in time my heart softened and my hate died away. My conscience won't let me rest, and now, when remorse has broken me, I drag myself to where Eric is, to learn what evil I have caused. If there be any wrong, it is I that have worked it--not my deceived husband, whom I have not the courage to face." Signed "Mathilde." {Kate.} Is that all? {Dormer.} _(pocketing paper)_ That is all. _(Kate rises)_ {Kate.} How comes this--creature to know of the existence of the woman who loves Eric Thorndyke?