She waited a minute for him to speak, then added imploringly: “Please go away now, Florian--please, please! I am very, very sorry to have caused you pain; but it can not be helped now, and I hope you will soon get over it. Oh, Florian, there is no use staying to reproach me! Oh, go, go, go!--only go!” Desperate with anxiety, she pointed to the door, and the wronged lover slowly rose, his burning eyes still fixed on her fatally lovely face. “Good-bye!” she cried, in a tone of relief, as she saw that he was going. Then he spoke in a strange and hollow voice: “So you really mean it, Viola? This is not an ill-timed jest?” “No, oh, no, it is the fatal truth!” she answered, quickly. “Why did you not write to me, Viola?” his voice sharp with anguish. “I meant to--but I feared your anger--I thought I would wait till after my marriage.” “Cruel heart!” he muttered, darkly, a soul’s despair in the burning, dark eyes he fixed on her excited face. “Go!” she answered, eagerly, pointing to the door. But instead of obeying, he strode forward, clutching her extended wrist in a grasp of steel. Bending his dark head, he almost hissed in her ear: “My rival--his name?” “I will not tell you! Release my wrist!” defiantly. “You will gain nothing by your silence. I will find it out, and woe be the traitor who stole you from me, beautiful, accursed coquette! My God! how false you are! Promising long ago to marry me, then binding me to silence that you might be free to ensnare other hearts! Do you remember the tender, loving words you used to write me before your fickle heart grew cold? I have them now, those letters warm against my breast! I will show them to your new conquest before I lay him dead at my feet!” hissed the outraged lover, giving way to a tempest of rage and revenge, as he threw her wrist from him so violently that she almost fell. Steadying herself against the back of a chair, Viola cried, in terror: “Oh, you will not dare to do this dastardly thing! You will not expose the weakness of a thoughtless girl who fancied that she loved you and found out she was mistaken. Surely that is no crime! Do you think his heart would turn against me so easily? Ah! no, no, no! Besides, why should you wish to wound him with this knowledge? He knew nothing of my engagement to you. He is not to blame for anything, unless you call his loving me a fault. You shall not betray me,” her eyes flashing luridly. “If you do I will fight you to the bitter end. I will deny your accusations!” “But you can not deny your letters!” “Oh, Florian, give them to me!” her defiance melting into fear. The cruel wrong he had suffered at her hands made him merciless. “You shall never have them! They will help me to revenge, wicked, false-hearted girl!” he almost hissed, rushing madly from her presence out into the bleak March night, a man whose heart and hopes had been blasted in an hour.