Tell me the story of the oriole, whose mate
this year is not the old. Go on; I am listening."
A twinge of his recent cowardice came back to him. He moistened his
lips.
"Why do you doubt my love?'"
"Doubt it! Have I not a peculiar evidence of it this very moment?"
sarcastically. Madame was gathering her forces slowly but surely.
"I have asked you to be my wife, not even knowing who you are."
Madame laughed, and a strain of wild merriment crept into the music of
it. "You have great courage, Monsieur."
"It is laughable, then?"
"If you saw it from my angle of vision, you would also laugh." The
tone was almost insolent.
"You are married?" a certain hardness in his voice.
Madame drew farther back, for he looked like the man who had, a few
nights since, seized her madly in his arms.
"If you are married," he said, his grey eyes metallic, "I will go at
once, for I should know that you are not a woman worthy of a man's
love."
"Go on, Monsieur; you interest me. Having asked me to listen to your
protestations of love, you would now have me listen to your analysis of
my character. Go on."
"That is not a denial.
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