A light burned there.

A longing, wistful look filled his blue eyes, his arms stretched out involuntarily, his heart gave a great plunge, as though it would break away and fly to its idol.
"My darling!" he murmured, passionately--"my darling, my life, my love, my wife! Oh, my God to think, I should love her, wildly, madly still, believing her--knowing her to be false!" He went up to his dressing-room, his heart full to bursting.

A mad, insane longing to go to her, to fold her to his breast, to forgive her all, to take her, guilty or innocent, and let pride and honor go to the winds, was upon him.

He loved her so intensely, so passionately, that life without her, apart from her, was hourly increasing torture.
The sight of a folded note lying on the table alone arrested his excited steps.

He took it up, looked at the strange superscription, tore it open, ran over its diabolical contents, and reeled as if struck a blow.
"Great Heaven! it is not true! it can not be true! it is a vile, accursed slander! My wife meet this man alone, and at midnight, in that forsaken spot! Oh, it is impossible! May curses light upon the slanderous coward who dared to write this infernal lie!" He flung it, in a paroxysm of mad fury, into the fire.