quarrel which he had dared to raise at the very moment when he had resolved to speak words of gentleness, love and submission to Christine. A husband, a lover with all rights, would talk no differently to a wife, a mistress who had offended him. But he had gone too far and saw no other way out of the ridiculous position than to behave odiously.
“You don’t answer!” he said angrily and unhappily. “Well, I will answer for you. It was because there was someone in the room who was in your way, Christine, someone that you did not wish to know that you could be interested in anyone else!”
“If anyone was in my way, my friend,” Christine broke in coldly, “if anyone was in my way, that evening, it was yourself, since I told you to leave the room!”
“Yes, so that you might remain with the other!”
“What are you saying, monsieur?” asked the girl excitedly. “And to what other do you refer?”
“To the man to whom you said, ‘I sing only for you! … Tonight I gave you my soul and I am dead!’ ”
Christine seized Raoul’s arm and clutched it with a strength which no one would have suspected in so frail a creature.
“Then you were listening behind the door?”
“Yes, because I love you … and I heard everything. …”
“You heard what?”
And the young girl, becoming strangely calm, released Raoul’s arm.
“He said to you, ‘Christine, you must love me!’ ”