"You are in love with some other man," he reiterated passionately. "Deny
it if you can!"

"Deny it?" she repeated, with flashing eyes. "What right have you to ask
the question? Am I not free to do as I please?"

He stood looking at her, meditating his next words with a sudden and
sinister change to self-restraint. Suppressed rage was in his rigidly
set eyes, suppressed rage was in his trembling hand as he raised it
emphatically while he spoke his next words.

"I have one thing more to say," he answered, "and then I have done. If
I am not your husband, no other man shall be. Look well to it, Isabel
Miller. If there _is_ another man between us, I can tell him this--he
shall find it no easy matter to rob me of you!"

She started, and turned pale--but it was only for a moment. The high
spirit that was in her rose brightly in her eyes, and faced him without
shrinking.

"Threats?" she said, with quiet contempt. "When you make love, Mr.
Moody, you take strange ways of doing it. My conscience is easy. You may
try to frighten me, but you will not succeed. When you have recovered
your temper I will accept your excuses." She paused, and pointed to the
table. "There is the letter that you told me to leave for you when I
had sealed it," she went on. "I suppose you have her Ladyship's orders.
Isn't it time you began to think of obeying them?"

The contemptuous composure of her tone and manner seemed to act on Moody