can say bitter things,' he replied.

'Is it my nature to say bitter things? Have I usually said bitter
things to you? When I have hung round your neck and have sworn that
you should be my God upon earth, was that bitter? I am alone and I
have to fight my own battles. A woman's weapon is her tongue. Say but
one word to me, Paul, as you know how to say it, and there will be
soon an end to that bitterness. What shall I care for Mr Carbury,
except to make him the cause of some innocent joke, if you will speak
but that one word? And think what it is I am asking. Do you remember
how urgent were once your own prayers to me;--how you swore that your
happiness could only be secured by one word of mine? Though I loved
you, I doubted. There were considerations of money, which have now
vanished. But I spoke it,--because I loved you, and because I believed
you. Give me that which you swore you had given before I made my gift
to you.'

'I cannot say that word.'

'Do you mean that, after all, I am to be thrown off like an old glove?
I have had many dealings with men and have found them to be false,
cruel, unworthy, and selfish. But I have met nothing like that. No man
has ever dared to treat me like that. No man shall dare.'

'I wrote to you.'

'Wrote to me;--yes! And I was to take that as sufficient! No. I think
but little of my life and have but little for which to live. But while
I do live I will travel over the world's surface to face injustice and
to expose it, before I will put up with it. You wrote to me! Heaven
and earth;--I can hardly control myself when I hear such impudence!' She
clenched her fist upon the knife that lay on the table as she looked
at him, and raising it, dropped it again at a further distance. 'Wrote
to me! Could any mere letter of your writing break the bond by which
we were bound together? Had not the distance between us seemed to have
made you safe would you have dared to write that letter? The letter
must be unwritten. It has already been contradicted by your conduct to
me since I have been in this country.'

'I am sorry to hear you say that.'

'Am I not justified in saying it?'

'I hope not. When I first saw you I told you everything. If I have
been wrong in attending to your wishes since, I regret it.'

'This comes from your seeing your master for two minutes on the beach.
You are acting now under his orders. No doubt he came with the
purpose. Had you told him you were to be here?'

'His