"Beulah!"
She looked up at him proudly. Resentment had usurped the place of
grief. But she could not bear the earnest eyes that looked into hers
with such misty splendor; and, provoked at her own emotion, she
asked coldly: "What do you want, sir?"
He did not answer at once, but stood observing her closely. She felt
the hot blood rush into her usually cold, pale face, and, despite
her efforts to seem perfectly indifferent, her eyelids and lips
would tremble. His hand rested lightly on her shoulder, and he spoke
very gently.
"Child, have you been ill? You look wretched. What ails you,
Beulah?"
"Nothing, sir."
"That will not answer. Tell me, child, tell me!"
"I tell you I am as well as usual," cried she impatiently, yet her
voice faltered. She was struggling desperately with her own heart.
The return of his old manner, the winning tones of his voice,
affected her more than she was willing he should see.
"Beulah, you used to be truthful and candid."
"I am so still," she returned stoutly, though tears began to gather
in her eyes.
"No, child; already the world has changed you."
A shadow fell over his face, and the sad eyes were like clouded
stars.
"You know better, sir! I am just what I always was! It is you who
are so changed! Once you were my friend; my guardian! Once you were
kind, and guided me; but now you are stern, and bitter, and
tyrannical!" She spoke passionately, and tears, which she bravely
tried to force back, rolled swiftly down her cheeks. His light touch
on her shoulder tightened until it seemed a hand of steel, and, with
an expression which she never forgot, even in after years, he
answered: "Tyrannical! Not to you, child!"
"Yes, sir; tyrannical! cruelly tyrannical! Because I dared to think
and act for myself, you have cast off--utterly! You try to see how
cold and distant you can be; and show me that you don't care whether
I live or die, so long as I choose to be independent of you. I did
not believe that you could ever be so ungenerous!" She looked up at
him with swimming eyes. He smiled down into her tearful face, and
asked: "Why did you defy me, child?"
"I did not, sir, until you treated me worse than the servants; worse
than you did Charon even."
"How?"
"How, indeed! You left me in your own house without one word of
good-by, when you expected to be absent an indefinite time. Did you
suppose that I would remain there an hour after such treatment?"