“I cannot—­will not believe it.  You are an impostor; you have assumed a dead man’s name.”

“My identity is easily proved, Cyprienne Vergette, and the relation in which I stand to you.”

“What brings you here to vex me, after all these years?  I always hated you.  I left you—­Why cannot you leave me in peace?”

“God knows I had no wish to see or speak to you again.  The world was wide enough for us both.  We should have remained for ever apart, but for your latest and foulest crime.”

“What false, lying charge is this you would trump up against me?”

“The murder of my dearest friend and comrade.  Murder twice attempted.  The first failed; the second, I fear, will prove fatal.  If so, look to yourself, madam.”

“What can you do?” she said, impudently, having regained much of her old effrontery.

“Prevent you from reaping the fruits of your iniquity.  You know you were never General Wilders’s wife; you were always mine.  Worse luck!”

“You cannot prove it.  You are dead.  You dare not reappear.”

“Wait and see,” he replied, very coolly.

“You have no proofs, I say, of the marriage.”

“They are safe at the Mairie, in Paris.  French archives are carefully kept.  I have only to ask for a certificate; it’s easy enough.”

“For any one who could go there.  But how will you dare to show yourself in Paris?  You are proscribed; a price is set on your head.  Your life would be forfeited.”

“I will risk all that, and more, to ruin your wicked game.”

“Do so at your peril.”

“You threaten me, vile wretch?  Be careful.  The measure of your iniquity is nearly full.  Punishment must soon overtake you; your misdeeds are well known; your complicity with—­”

Why should he tell her?  Why warn her of the net that was closing round her, and thus help her to escape from the toils?

But she had caught at his words.

“Complicity?” she repeated, anxiously.  “With whom?”

“No matter.  Only look to yourself.  It is war, war to the knife, unquenchable war between us, remember that.”

And with these words he left the house.

Although she had shown a bold front, Mrs. Wilders, as we shall still call her, was greatly agitated by this stormy scene, and it was with a blanched cheek and faltering step that she sought her confederate in the next room.

Mr. Hobson was gone.

“Coward! he has easily taken alarm.  To desert me at the moment that I most need advice and help!”

But she did her friend injustice, as a letter that came from him in the course of a few hours fully proved.