I know this was so.

I know it was a challenge, a defiance, an ordeal by combat; and the knowledge hurt me, so that I felt like a Dathan or Abiram who had laid hand on the Ark of the Covenant (for the soul of a woman, by heaven! is a holy thing), and I wished that the earth could open and swallow me up.
We sat down to table in the middle of the great room--a quiet corner on the balcony away from the band is not to Carlotta's taste--like any conventional party of four, and at first talked of indifferent matters.
Conciergerie dinner-parties in the Terror always began with a discussion of the latest cure for megrims, or the most fashionable cut of a panier.
Presently Pasquale who had been talking travel with Judith appealed to me.
"What year was it, Ordeyne, that I came home from Abyssinia ?" "I forget," said I."I only remember you presenting me with that hideous thing hanging in my passage, which you called a dulcimer." _"Gage d'amour ?"_ smiled Judith.
Pasquale laughed and twirled his swaggering moustache.
"I did get it from a damsel, and that is why I called it a dulcimer, but she didn't sing of Mount Abora.

I wish I could remember the year." "I think it was in 1894," said Judith quietly.
Pasquale, who had been completely unaware of Judith's existence until half an hour before, could not repress a stare of polite surprise.
"I believe you are right.

In fact, you are.

But how can you tell ?" "Through the kindness of Sir Marcus," replied Judith graciously, "you are a very old acquaintance.