FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157  
158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182   >>   >|  
d that I was the immediate cause of the tragedy, and you say that you were talking of Henrietta's--of Henrietta. I had nothing to do with her illness." Trefusis looked at her as if considering whether he would go any further. Then, watching her with the curiosity of a vivisector, he said: "Strange to say, Agatha," (she shrank proudly at the word), "Henrietta might have been alive now but for you. I am very glad she is not; so you need not reproach yourself on my account. She died of a journey she made to Lyvern in great excitement and distress, and in intensely cold weather. You caused her to make that journey by writing her a letter which made her jealous." "Do you mean to accuse me--" "No; stop!" he said hastily, the vivisecting spirit in him exorcised by her shaking voice; "I accuse you of nothing. Why do you not speak honestly to me when you are at your ease? If you confess your real thoughts only under torture, who can resist the temptation to torture you? One must charge you with homicide to make you speak of anything but orchids." But Agatha had drawn the new inference from the old facts, and would not be talked out of repudiating it. "It was not my fault," she said. "It was yours--altogether yours." "Altogether," he assented, relieved to find her indignant instead of remorseful. She was not to be soothed by a verbal acquiescence. "Your behavior was most unmanly, and I told you so, and you could not deny it. You pretended that you--You pretended to have feelings--You tried to make me believe that Oh, I am a fool to talk to you; you know perfectly well what I mean." "Perfectly. I tried to make you believe that I was in love with you. How do you know I was not?" She disdained to answer; but as he waited calmly she said, "You had no right to be." "That does not prove that I was not. Come, Agatha, you pretended to like me when you did not care two straws about me. You confessed as much in that fatal letter, which I have somewhere at home. It has a great rent right across it, and the mark of her heel; she must have stamped on it in her rage, poor girl! So that I can show your own hand for the very deception you accused me--without proof--of having practiced on you." "You are clever, and can twist things. What pleasure does it give you to make me miserable?" "Ha!" he exclaimed, in an abrupt, sardonic laugh. "I don't know; you bewitch me, I think." Agatha made no reply, but walked on quickly
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157  
158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Agatha
 

pretended

 

Henrietta

 

accuse

 

letter

 
journey
 
torture
 

bewitch

 
perfectly
 

miserable


clever

 

answer

 
waited
 

calmly

 
disdained
 

things

 
Perfectly
 
feelings
 

acquiescence

 

quickly


walked

 

pleasure

 

verbal

 

remorseful

 

soothed

 

behavior

 

practiced

 

unmanly

 

indignant

 

sardonic


stamped

 
exclaimed
 

abrupt

 

confessed

 

deception

 
straws
 

accused

 
proudly
 

reproach

 
intensely

weather
 

caused

 
distress
 
excitement
 

account

 

Lyvern

 
shrank
 

Strange

 
talking
 

illness