Page:Idalia, by 'Ouida' volume 2.djvu/61

50 look on him savage, passionate, but withal that better than any look he had given, for a hot and frank wrath was in it, with something of generous challenge.

"What do you mean by that?"

"I mean what I say—no more. This gentleman—your Carpathian friend—found her out while he was chasing what he very absurdly calls his 'assassin' down the Bosphorus shore; he dined with her when we were there, and the Countess appeared to take a very flattering interest in the landless laird. He is a handsome giant, you know, and I have often noticed that your women of intellect have a wonderful eye for physical perfections!"

With every quiet word he plunged a stab of steel into his listener's heart, with every one he veiled more closely the passions that were moving in his own. The colour changed in Phaulcon's face, he writhed under every syllable, but he could resist none; the same merciless tyranny as he had exercised over Idalia was used over him now, and he had not the fearless and haughty strength which was in hers that could have enabled him to defy or to disdain it.

"In the East—in the East?" he muttered. "With her?—and she never told me!"