His Other Wife: A Novel — page 127: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

SPINNING A WEB. 11g It was Warren who uttered the last remark, in a low significant tone, as Mrs. Dalton turned to answer a Weer tion from her other neighbor. A deep flush suffused the soft peach-bloom of Leda’s beauty, and she said, gently: “You are severe, and therein unjust to me. If you but knew the truth—the dreadful, bitter truth—that un- a? derlies the seeming falseness She halted abruptly. Her lip was quivering, and she seemed about to lose her self-command utterly. Warren hastened to say :~ ‘‘T pray you say no more, madam. I confess my fault in provoking the retrospective. What is done is done, and the past is worse than nothing to either of us.” Immediately addressing his attention to the other lady beside him, Warren left Mrs. Croft to the opposite man on her left, and the dinner passed without further incident worthy of being recorded. Nevertheless, Leda’s allusion to that fiery epoch whose flame had seared through his being, and whose heat still smoldered at his heart, awoke strange sensations in War- rens breast. Deep as was the contempt he felt for the woman who could wed one man for mercenary advantage, with her heart inflamed by passion for another, there yet lingered with him a certain feverish pain in remembering the en- chanted days when his soul lay at her feet and pulsed in her hand if it but touched his own, EComicbooks;com ru)