“Yes; but she is more lonely than ever now.  That cousin who is the greatest fool of all, who might have had every thing—­mon Dieu! yes, every thing—­she would have given it all to him with a sweep of her hand if he would have taken it.  He is to marry himself to a little brown girl who has not a shilling.  No one but an Englishman could make follies so abominable as these.  Ah!  I am sick—­I am sick when I remember it!” And Sophie gave unmistakable signs of a grief which could hardly have been self interested.  But, in truth, she suffered pain in seeing a good game spoiled.  It was not that she had any wish for Harry Clavering’s welfare.  Had he gone to the bottom of the sea in the same boat with his cousins, the tidings of his fate would have been pleasurable to her rather than otherwise.  But when she saw such cards thrown away as he had held in his hand, she encountered that sort of suffering which a good player feels when he sits behind the chair of one who plays up to his adversary’s trump, and makes no tricks of his own kings and aces.

“He may marry himself to the devil if he please—­it is nothing to me,” said the count.

“But she is there—­by herself—­at that place—­what is it called?  Ten—­bie.  Will you not go now, when you can do no harm?”

“No, I will not go now.”

“And in a year she will have taken some other one for her husband.”

“What is that to me?  But look here, Sophie, far you may as well understand me at once, if I were ever to think of Lady Ongar again as my wife, I should not tell you.”

“And why not tell me—­your sister?”

“Because it would do me no good.  If you had not been there she would have been my wife now.”

“Edouard!”

“What I say is true.  But I do not want to reproach you because of that.  Each of us was playing his own game, and your game was not my game.  You are going now, and if I play my game again I can play it alone.”

Upon hearing this, Sophie sat a while in silence, looking at him.  “You will play it alone,” she said at last.  “You would rather do that?”

“Much rather, if I play any game at all.”

“And you will give me something to go?”

“Not one sou.”

“You will not—­not a sou?”

“Not half a sou—­for you to go or stay.  Sophie, are you not a fool to ask me for money?”

“And you are a fool—­a fool who knows nothing.  You need not look at me like that.  I am not afraid.  I shall remain here.  I shall stay and do as the lawyer tells me.  He says that if I bring my action she must pay me for my expenses.  I will bring my action.  I am not going to leave it all to you.  No.  Do you remember those days in Florence?  I have not been paid yet, but I will be paid.  One hundred and seventy-five thousand francs a year—­and, after all, I am to have none of it!  Say—­should it become yours, will you do something for your sister?”