"This lady is my wife, the Countess Hellayne de Laval, noble Theodora, who has followed her perjured lover to Rome, so they may do penance in company," he replied sardonically. "His life is forfeit. His offence is two-fold. Within the hour he swore he knew naught of her abode. But--since you claim him,--by ties this scarf proclaims--take him and welcome! I shall not anticipate the fate you prepare for your noble lovers!" The two women faced each other in frozen silence, in the consciousness of being rivals. Each knew instinctively it would be a fight between them to the death. Theodora surveyed Hellayne's wonderful beauty, appraising her charms against her own, and Hellayne's gaze swept the face and form of the Roman. Tristan had scrambled to his feet, his face white with shame and rage. From Theodora, in whose eyes he read that which caused him to tremble in his inmost soul, he turned to Hellayne. "Oh, why have you done this thing, Hellayne, why?--oh, why?" Roger de Laval laughed viciously. "It was indeed not to be expected that the Lady Hellayne would find her recalcitrant lover in the arms of the Lady Theodora." With an inarticulate outcry of rage Tristan was about to hurl himself upon his opponent, had not Theodora placed a restraining hand upon him, while her dark eyes challenged Hellayne. All the revulsion of his nature against this man rose up in him and rent him. All the love for Hellayne, which in these days had been floating on the wings of longing, soared anew. But his efforts at vindication in this strangest of all predicaments were put to naught by the woman herself. "Hear me, Hellayne--it is not true!" he cried, and paused with a choking sensation. Hellayne stood as if turned to stone. Then her eyes swept Tristan with a look of such incredulous misery that it froze the words that were about to tumble from his lips. With a wail of anguish she turned and fled down the moonlit path like a hunted deer. "Up and after her!" Laval shouted to the men whom Hellayne had summoned to the scene and these, eager to demonstrate their usefulness, started in pursuit, Roger leading, ere Tristan could even make a move to interfere. Hellayne had fled into the open portals of a church at the end of the street. She tottered and fell. Crawling through the semi-darkness she gasped and leaned against a pillar. She saw a small side chapel, where, before an image of the Virgin, guttered a brace of tapers. But ere she reached the shrine her pursuers were upon her. As, with a shriek of mortal fear she fell, she gazed into the brutal features of Roger de Laval. His lips were foam-flecked, revealing his wolfish teeth. It was then her strength forsook her. She fell fainting upon the hard stone floor of the church.-- For a pace Tristan and Theodora faced each other in silence. It was the woman who spoke. Her voice was cold as steel.