But though she tried to tell herself that there was forbearance in him, she felt, instinctively, that there was deeper kindness in direct, thrusting fury than in this man's sinister mockery.
She had sunk back upon the divan on the bey's approach; now as he stood before her with that mask of a smile upon his face, drawing a silk handkerchief across a forehead she saw glistening in the candlelight, she leaned towards him again, her hands involuntarily clasping.
"Monsieur, I seem to have done you a great wrong," she said tremblingly, "but it is not so great as you suppose. Will you listen to me? I--"
"Useless, useless." He waved the handkerchief negligently at her. "I have had words enough. You are not the daughter of Tewfick Pasha--you are his step-daughter--your French family desires to capture you--I know the rigmarole by heart, you observe. And of course when a French family desires to obtain possession of a charming step-daughter, on the eve of her marriage, that family always employs a handsome young man to break into the bride's chamber--and point a gun at the husband--"
His mustache lifted in a grimacing sneer.
"But it _is_ true, and I _am_ French," she interposed swiftly.
"Excellent--I do not object in the least." He shot his handkerchief up his cuff, and turned to her with eyes that lightly mocked the agonized appeal of the young face. "French blood is delightful--quicksilver and champagne. You will enliven me, I promise you."
"But the marriage--it is not legal, monsieur," she said desperately, summoning all her courage. "Tewfick Pasha has no right to give me to you--"
Indulgently he smiled down at her, then his narrowed eyes traveled slowly about the room.
"But this is a strange time--and place!--to talk of legalities. Do not distress yourself--your step-father is your guardian and your marriage will be as binding as the oaths of the prophet. Have no qualms.... And now, if your French blood will smile a little--"
He started to seat himself beside her, but in that instant she was on her feet. With all the courage in her beating heart she whipped out that revolver and pointed it at him.
"If you call--I shoot," she said breathlessly.
The round mouth of the gun shook ever so slightly in the excited hand gripping it, but in the blazing look she turned on him was the unshaken, imperious passion of a woman swept absolutely beyond all fear.