"Yes," said Ferris, stolidly, "I did at last: he told me."
"Oh, then you acted generously and nobly to let him go on! It was kind to him, and very, very kind to me!"
"What could I do?" demanded Ferris, amazed and furious to find himself on the defensive. "His telling me put it out of my power to act."
"I'm glad that you can satisfy yourself with such a quibble! But I wonder that you can tell _me_--_any_ woman of it!"
"By Heavens, this is atrocious!" cried Ferris. "Do you think ... Look here!" he went on rudely. "I'll put the case to you, and you shall judge it. Remember that I was such a fool as to be in love with you. Suppose Don Ippolito had told me that he was going to risk everything--going to give up home, religion, friends--on the ten thousandth part of a chance that you might some day care for him. I did not believe he had even so much chance as that; but he had always thought me his friend, and he trusted me. Was it a quibble that kept me from betraying him? I don't know what honor is among women; but no _man_ could have done it. I confess to my shame that I went to your house that night longing to betray him. And then suppose your mother sent me into the garden to call you, and I saw ... what has made my life a hell of doubt for the last two years; what ... No, excuse me! I can't put the case to you after all."
"What do you mean?" asked Florida. "I don't understand you!"
"What do I mean? You don't understand? Are you so blind as that, or are you making a fool of me? What could I think but that you had played with that priest's heart till your own"....
"Oh!" cried Florida with a shudder, starting away from him, "did you think I was such a wicked girl as that?"
It was no defense, no explanation, no denial; it simply left the case with Ferris as before. He stood looking like a man who does not know whether to bless or curse himself, to laugh or blaspheme.
She stooped and tried to pick up the things she had let fall upon the floor; but she seemed not able to find them. He bent over, and, gathering them together, returned them to her with his left hand, keeping the other in the breast of his coat.
"Thanks," she said; and then after a moment, "Have you been hurt?" she asked timidly.