"I will give you one minute to leave this place," she said, her tones
as even and as cold as sudden repression of wrath could make them. "I
trusted you, and you have dared to take advantage of what seemed my
helplessness. It is well indeed for you that you committed this
outrage before it is too late. I should have killed you then. I might
have known. Could ever a woman trust a man?" She laughed
contemptuously. "You would have made me a thing of scorn; and I
trusted you!"
"As God is my judge," I cried, "my respect for you is as high as heaven
itself. I love you; is there nothing in that? I am but human. I am
not a stone image. And you have tempted me beyond all control. Pardon
what I have done; it was not the want of respect--."
"Spare me your protestations. I believe your minute is nearly gone,"
she interrupted.
And then--there was a crunch on the gravel behind us. The Princess and
I turned in dismay. We had forgotten all about the anonymous note.
Two officers were approaching us, and rapidly. The elder of the two
came straight to me. I knew him to be as inexorable as his former
master, the victor of Sedan.
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