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138 you decline the reward you have earned so worthily, and I have the honour to wish you good evening."

He gave a low musical laugh. "Pardon me, mademoiselle," he said, "but really your words amuse me. 'A disinterested villain!' Believe me, when I tell you that disinterested villany is as great an impossibility as disinterested virtue. You are mistaken, mademoiselle, but only as to the nature of the reward I come to claim. You would confine the question to one of money. Cannot you imagine that I have acted in the hope of a higher reward than any recompense your banker's book could afford me?"

She looked at him with a puzzled expression, but his face was hidden. He was trifling with his light riding-whip, and looking down at the hearth. After a minute's pause he lifted his head, and glanced at her with the same dangerous smile.

"You cannot guess, then, mademoiselle, the price I claim for my services yonder?" he asked.

"No."

"Nay, mademoiselle, reflect."

"It would be useless. I might anticipate your claiming half my fortune, as I am, in a manner, in your power"

"Oh, yes," he murmured softly, interrupting her, "you are, in a manner, in my power certainly."

"But the possibility of your claiming from me anything except money has never for a moment occurred to me."

"Mademoiselle, when first I saw you I looked at you through an opera-glass from my place in the stalls of the Italian Opera. The glass, mademoiselle, was an excellent one, for it revealed every line and every change in your beautiful face. From my observation of that face I made two or three conclusions about your character, which I now find were not made upon false premises. You are impulsive, mademoiselle, but you are not far-seeing. You are strong in your resolutions when once your mind is fixed; but that mind is easily influenced by others. You have passion, genius, courage—rare and beautiful gifts which distinguish you from the rest of womankind; but you have not that power of calculation, that inductive science, which never sees the effect without looking for the cause, which men have christened mathematics. I, mademoiselle, am a mathematician. As such, I sat down to play a deep and dangerous game with you; and as such, now that the hour has come at which I can show my hand, you will see that I hold the winning cards."

"I cannot understand, monsieur"

"Perhaps not, yet. When you first honoured me with an interview you were pleased to call me 'an adventurer.' You used the expression as a term of reproach. Strange to say, I never