'He knew of the letter which I wrote to you.'
'You have canvassed me between you?'
'Of course we have. Is that unnatural? Would you have had me be silent about you to the oldest and the best friend I have in the world?'
'No, I would not have had you be silent to your oldest and best friend. I presume you would declare your purpose. But I should not have supposed you would have asked his leave. When I was travelling with you, I thought you were a man capable of managing your own actions. I had heard that in your country girls sometimes hold themselves at the disposal of their friends,--but I did not dream that such could be the case with a man who had gone out into the world to make his fortune.'
Paul Montague did not like it. The punishment to be endured was being commenced. 'Of course you 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.'