"I could almost fancy," she went on, "that you want to visit on him
your resentment against the virtue that resisted you--in a woman whom
you loved well enough--to--to buy her," she added in a low voice.
"In a divine woman," Crevel replied, with a meaning smile at the
Baroness, who looked down while tears rose to her eyes. "For you have
swallowed not a few bitter pills!--in these three years--hey, my
beauty?"
"Do not talk of my troubles, dear Crevel; they are too much for the
endurance of a mere human being. Ah! if you still love me, you may
drag me out of the pit in which I lie. Yes, I am in hell torment! The
regicides who were racked and nipped and torn into quarters by four
horses were on roses compared with me, for their bodies only were
dismembered, and my heart is torn in quarters----"
Crevel's thumb moved from his armhole, he placed his hand on the
work-table, he abandoned his attitude, he smiled! The smile was so
vacuous that it misled the Baroness; she took it for an expression
of kindness.
"You see a woman, not indeed in despair, but with her honor at the
point of death, and prepared for everything, my dear friend, to hinder
a crime."
Fearing that Hortense might come in, she bolted the door; then with
equal impetuosity she fell at Crevel's feet, took his hand and kissed
it.
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