And still Monck remained passive, grim and cold and unyielding.  “How long is it since you married her?” he questioned at last.

“I tell you I never married her!” Desperately Dacre sought to recover lost ground, but he had slipped too far.

“You told me that lie before,” Monck observed in his even judicial tones.  “Is it—­worth while?”

Dacre glared at him, but his glare was that of the hunted animal trapped and helpless.  He was conquered, and he knew it.

Calmly Monck continued.  “There is not much doubt that she holds proof of the marriage, and she will probably try to establish it as soon as she is free.”

“She will never get anything more out of me,” said Dacre.  His voice was low and sullen.  There was that in the other man’s attitude that stilled his fury, rendering it futile, even in a fashion ridiculous.

“I am not thinking of you.”  Monck’s coldness had in it something brutal.  “You are not the only person concerned.  But the fact remains—­this woman is your wife.  You may as well tell the truth about it as not—­since I know.”

Dacre jerked his head like an angry bull, but he submitted.  “Oh well, if you must have it, I suppose she was—­once,” he said.  “She caught me when I was a kid of twenty-one.  She was a bad ’un even then, and it didn’t take me long to find it out.  I could have divorced her several times over, only the marriage was a secret and I didn’t want my people to know.  The last I heard of her was that her name was among the drowned on a wrecked liner going to America.  That was six years ago or more; and I was thankful to be rid of her.  I regarded her death as one of the biggest slices of luck I’d ever had.  And now—­curse her!”—­he ended savagely—­“she has come to life again!”

He glanced at Monck with the words, almost as if seeking sympathy; but Monck’s face was masklike in its unresponsiveness.  He said nothing whatever.

In a moment Dacre took up the tale.  “I’ve considered myself free ever since we separated, after only six weeks together.  Any man would.  It was nothing but a passing fancy.  Heaven knows why I was fool enough to marry her, except that I had high-flown ideas of honour in those days, and I got drawn in.  She never regarded it as binding, so why in thunder should I?” He spoke indignantly, as one who had the right of complaint.

“Your ideas of honour having altered somewhat,” observed Monck, with bitter cynicism.

Dacre winced a little.  “I don’t profess to be anything extraordinary,” he said.  “But I maintain that marriage gives no woman the right to wreck a man’s life.  She has no more claim upon me now than the man in the moon.  If she tries to assert it, she will soon find her mistake.”  He was beginning to recover his balance, and there was even a hint of his customary complacence audible in his voice as he made the declaration.  “But there is no reason to believe she will,” he added.  “She knows very well that she has nothing whatever to gain by it.  Your brother seems to have gathered but a vague idea of the affair.  You had better write and tell him that the Dacre he means is dead.  Your brother-officer belongs to another branch of the family.  That ought to satisfy everybody and no great harm done, what?”