I'd never descend to scheming and plotting and pitting my fascinations
against another woman--"
"Oh, damn your aristocratic highfalutin pride. I suppose you mean that
I have no such pride, having no inherited right to it. Perhaps not or I
wouldn't be here to-day. At least I wouldn't be talking to you," she added,
her voice hoarse with significance.
Once more Alexina eyed the muff. "Did you come here to kill me?"
"Yes, I did. No, I haven't a pistol. I couldn't get one. I trusted to
opportunity. When I saw you standing at the edge of that hole I thought I
had it."
Alexina found it impossible to repress a shiver but in spite of those
dreadful eyes she felt no recurrence of fear.
"What good would that have done you? Murderesses get short shrift in
France. There is none of that sickening sentimentalism here that we are
cursed with in our country."
"Murders are not always found out. If you were at the bottom of that hole
it would be long before you were found and there is no reason why I should
be suspected. I didn't come through the village. I didn't even inquire at
your house. I saw you leave it and followed at a distance. If I'd pushed
you down there I'd have followed and killed you if you were not dead
already."
Alexina wondered if she intended to rush her. But she was sure of her
own strength. If one of them went down that hole it would not be she.
Nevertheless she was beginning to feel sorry for Gora.
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