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This incautious echo of the lieutenant undoes her.

Napoleon starts; his eyes flash; he utters a yell of rage.

N a p o l e o n : What!!!

L a d y : What's the matter?

N a p o l e o n : Shew your confidence in me! So that I may shew my confidence in you in return by letting you give me the slip with

the despatches, eh? Dalila, Dalila,6 you have been trying your tricks on me; and I have been as gross a gull as my jackass of a lieu-

tenant. ( Menacingly.) Come: the despatches. Quick: I am not to be trifled with now.

L a d y (flying round the couch ) : General —

N a p o l e o n : Quick, I tell you.

L a d y (at bay, confronting him and giving way to her temper): You dare address me in that tone.

N a p o l e o n : Dare!

L a d y : Yes, dare. Who are you that you should presume to speak to me in that coarse way? Oh, the vile, vulgar Corsican ad-

venturer comes out in you very easily.

N a p o l e o n (beside himself): You she-devil! (Savagely.) Once more, and only once, will you give me those papers or shall I tear

them from you? — by force!

L a d y : Tear them from me: by force!

The Lady without speaking, stands upright, and takes a packet of papers from her bosom. She hands them politely to Napoleon.

The moment he takes them, she hurries across to the other side of the room; sits down and covers her face with her hands.

N a p o l e o n (gloating over the papers): Aha! That's right. (Before he opens them, he looks at her and says.) Excuse me. (He sees

that she is hiding her face.) Very angry with me, eh? (He unties the packet, the seal of which is already broken, and puts it on the table

to examine its contents.)

L a d y (quietly, taking down her hands and shewing that she is not crying, but only thinking ): No. You were right. But I am sorry

for you.

N a p o l e o n (pausing in the act of taking the uppermost paper from the packet): Sorry for me! Why?

L a d y : I am going to see you lose your honor.

N a p o l e o n : Hm! Nothing worse than that? (He takes up the paper.)

L a d y : And your happiness.

N a p o l e o n : Happiness! Happiness is the most tedious thing in the world to me. Should I be what I am if I cared for happiness.

Anything else?

L a d y : Nothing.

N a p o l e o n : Good.

L a d y : Except that you will cut a very foolish figure in the eyes of France.

N a p o l e o n (quickly): What? (He throws the letter down and breaks out into a torrent of scolding.) What do you mean? Eh? Are

you at your tricks again? Do you think I don't know what these papers contain? I'll tell you. First, my information as to Beau- lieu's 7

retreat. You are one of his spies: he has discovered that he had been betrayed, and has sent you to intercept the information. As if that

could save him from me, the old fool! The other papers are only my private letters from Paris, of which you know nothing.

L a d y (prompt and business-like): General: let us make § fair division. Take the information your spies have sent you about the

Austrian army; and give me the Paris correspondence. That will content me.