"Ah, my friend," Madame de Staemer laid her hand upon my arm with that
caressing gesture which I knew, "you do understand, don't you? The
power to use my limbs returned to me during the last week that I lived
in Nice."
She bent forward and raised her face, in an almost agonized appeal to
Val Beverley.
"My dear, my dear," she said, "forgive me, forgive me! But I loved him
so. One day, I think"--her glance sought my face--"you will know. Then
you will forgive."
"Oh, Madame, Madame," whispered the girl, and began to sob silently.
"Is it enough?" asked Madame de Staemer, raising her head, and looking
defiantly at Paul Harley. "Last night, you, M. Harley, who have genius,
nearly brought it all to nothing. You passed the door in the shrubbery
just when Juan was preparing to go out. I was watching from the window
above. Then, when you had gone, he came out--smoking his last
cigarette.
"I went to my place, entering the tower room by the door from that
corridor. I opened the window. It had been carefully oiled. It was
soundless. I was cold as one already dead, but love made me strong. I
had seen him suffer.
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