'They told me that--you fought him.'
'Psha;--fought him! Yes;--I was always fighting him. What are you to do but to fight cruelty, and fight falsehood, and fight fraud and treachery,--when they come upon you and would overwhelm you but for fighting? You have not been fool enough to believe that fable about a duel? I did stand once, armed, and guarded my bedroom door from him, and told him that he should only enter it over my body. He went away to the tavern and I did not see him for a week afterwards. That was the duel. And they have told you that he is not dead.'
'Yes;--they have told me that.'
'Who has seen him alive? I never said to you that I had seen him dead. How should I?'
'There would be a certificate.'
'Certificate;--in the back of Texas;--five hundred miles from Galveston! And what would it matter to you? I was divorced from him according to the law of the State of Kansas. Does not the law make a woman free here to marry again,--and why not with us? I sued for a divorce on the score of cruelty and drunkenness. He made no appearance, and the Court granted it me. Am I disgraced by that?'
'I heard nothing of the divorce.'
'I do not remember. When we were talking of these old days before, you did not care how short I was in telling my story. You wanted to hear little or nothing then of Caradoc Hurtle. Now you have become more particular. I told you that he was dead,--as I believed myself, and do believe. Whether the other story was told or not I do not know.'
'It was not told.'
'Then it was your own fault,--because you would not listen. And they have made you believe I suppose that I have failed in getting back my property?'
'I have heard nothing about your property but what you yourself have said unasked. I have asked no question about your property.'
'You are welcome. At last I have made it again my own. And now, sir, what else is there? I think I have been open with you. Is it because I protected myself from drunken violence that I am to be rejected? Am I to be cast aside because I saved my life while in the hands of a reprobate husband, and escaped from him by means provided by law;--or because by my own energy I have secured my own property? If I am not to be condemned for these things, then say why am I condemned.'