"Have a care how you trifle, sir!" she retorted, her eyes kindling again.

"Upon my honour, 't was no more than that. I pulled the cloth from the
table whilst he ate. He was a quick-tempered gentleman, and my playfulness
offended him. That is all."

Doubt appeared in her eyes, and it may have entered her mind that perchance
her judgment had been over-hasty.

"Do you mean, sir, that you provoked a duel?"

"Alas, Madame! It had become necessary. You see, M. de Canaples--"

"Who?" Her voice rang sharp as the crack of a pistol.

"Eh? M. de Canaples."

"Was it he whom you killed?"

From her tone, and the eager, strained expression of her face, it was not
difficult to read that some mighty interest of hers was involved in my
reply. It needed not the low moan that burst from her companion to tell me
so.

"As I have said, Madame, it is possible that he is not dead--nay, even that
he will not die. For the rest, since you ask the question, my opponent
was, indeed, M. de Canaples--Eugène de Canaples."

Her face went deadly white, and she sank back in her seat as if every nerve
in her body had of a sudden been bereft of power, whilst she of the fair