"You're a very smart-looking woman," he cried, with some reluctance. "You're beautiful, Hilda. I don't blame the young fool for falling. But you're too old, too wise--" Hilda nodded. "You've said it. Too old and too wise. If I'd been as young and as silly as when I met you--who knows? He's a handsome boy." Again the husband's anger blazed up. "But I'm not young and silly," his wife interrupted. "Just the same, you played me a rotten trick," the Count exploded. "And I don't forget. As for him"--he swore savagely--"he'll learn that it's not safe to humiliate me, to rob me of any woman--wife or mistress. You've never told me the half; I've had to guess. But I'm patient, I know how to wait and to use my eyes and my ears. Then to strike me! Perdition! I'll follow this through, never fear." "How did you get a thousand dollars, Henri?" the wife inquired, curiously. Courteau's gaze shifted. "What difference? I won it on a turn at the North Star; it was given to me; I found it. Anyhow, I had it. It was a good night for me; yes, a very good night. I had my revenge and I showed my friends that I'm a man to be reckoned with." In a tone unexpectedly humble the woman said: "I had no idea you cared very much what I did or how I carried on. After all, it was your own fault." "Mine?" The Count laughed in derision and astonishment. "Exactly! If you had taken the trouble to show me that you cared--well, things might have been different. However--" The Countess rose, and with another change of voice and manner said: "Come along. Let's do something for your eye." The Count stared at her in bewilderment, then he turned away, crying: "Bah! I want no help." At the door he paused to jeer once more. "Pierce Phillips! A common thief, a despicable creature who robs the very man he had most deeply injured. I've exposed him to the law and to public scorn. Sleep on that, my dear. Dream on it." With a chuckle he traced an uncertain course to the stairs, mounted them to his room, and slammed his door behind him. He had undressed and flung himself into bed, but he had not yet fallen asleep when the door reopened and his wife entered, bearing in her hand a steaming pitcher of hot water. This she deposited; into it she dipped a folded towel. "I'm sorry you're disfigured, Henri," she told him, quietly. Despite his surly protests, she bathed and soothed his swollen features until he dropped asleep, after which she stole out and down to her room on the floor below. There, however, she paused, staring back up the empty stairway, a look of deepest loathing upon her face. Slowly, carefully, she wiped her hands as if they were unclean; her lips curled into a mirthless smile; then she passed into her chamber and turned the key behind her.