He knew now in a flash what he had to do.  He must save her.  He saw that Rudyard was armed, and that the end might come at any moment.  There was in the wronged husband’s eyes the wild, reckless, unseeing thing which disregards consequences, which would rush blindly on the throne of God itself to snatch its vengeance.  He spoke again:  and just in time.

“I think what you think, Byng, but I would not do what you want to do.  I would do something else.”

His voice was strangely quiet, but it had a sharp insistence which caused Rudyard to turn back mechanically to the seat he had just left.  Stafford saw the instant’s advantage which, if he did not pursue, all would be lost.  With a great effort he simulated intense anger and indignation.

“Sit down, Byng,” he said, with a gesture of authority.  He leaned over the table, holding the other’s eyes, the letter in one clinched hand.  “Kill him—­,” he said, and pointed to the other room, from which came the maddening iteration of the jingling song—­“you would kill him for his hellish insolence, for this infamous attempt to lead your wife astray, but what good will it do to kill him?”

“Not him alone, but her too,” came the savage, uncontrolled voice from the uncontrolled savagery of the soul.

Suddenly a great fear shot up in Stafford’s heart.  His breath came in sharp, breaking gasps.  Had he—­had he killed Jasmine?

“You have not—­not her?”

“No—­not yet.”  The lips of the avenger suddenly ceased twitching, and they shut with ominous certainty.

An iron look came into Stafford’s face.  He had his chance now.  One word, one defense only!  It would do all, or all would be lost—­sunk in a sea of tragedy.  Diplomacy had taught him the gift of control of face and gesture, of meaning in tone and word.  He made an effort greater than he had ever put forward in life.  He affected an enormous and scornful surprise.

“You think—­you dare to think that she—­that Jasmine—­”

“Think, you say!  The letter—­that letter—­”

“This letter—­this letter, Byng—­are you a fool?  This letter, this preposterous thing from the universal philanderer, the effeminate erotic!  It is what it is, and it is no more.  Jasmine—­you know her.  Indiscreet—­yes; always indiscreet in her way, in her own way, and always daring.  A coquette always.  She has coquetted all her life; she cannot help it.  She doesn’t even know it.  She led him on from sheer wilfulness.  What did it matter to her that he was of no account!  She led him on, to be at her feet like the rest, like bigger and better men—­like us all.  Was there ever a time when she did not want to master us?  She has coquetted since—­ah, you do not know as I do, her old friend!  She has coquetted since she was a little child.  Coquetted, and no more.  We have all been her slaves—­yes, long before you came—­all of us.  Look at Mennaval!  She—­”

With a distracted gesture Byng interrupted.  “The world believes the worst.  Last night, by accident, I heard at De Lancy Scovel’s house that she and Mennaval—­and now this—!”