'But, curse me, I know what I want!' he answered gloomily. 'You may go
farther and fare worse! Lord, I swear you may. I'd be kind to you, and
it is not everybody would be that!' She had turned from him that he might not see her face, and she did not
answer. He waited a moment, twiddling his hat; his face was overcast,
his mood hung between spite and pity. At last, 'Well, 'tisn't my fault,'
he said; and then relenting again, 'But there, I know what women
are--vapours one day, kissing the next. I'll try again, my lady. I am
not proud.' She flung him a gesture that meant assent, dissent, dismissal, as he
pleased to interpret it. He took it to mean the first, and muttering,
'Well, well, have it your own way. I'll go for this time. But hang all
prudes, say I,' he withdrew reluctantly, and slowly closed the door
on her.
As soon as he was gone the tempest, which Julia's pride had enabled her
to stern for a time, broke forth in a passion of tears and sobs, and,
throwing herself on the shabby window-seat, she gave free vent to her
grief. The happy future which the little bean had dangled before her
eyes, absurdly as he had fashioned and bedecked it, reminded her all too
sharply of that which she had promised herself with one, in whose
affections she had fancied herself secure, despite the attacks of the
prettiest Abigail in the world. How fondly had her fancy depicted life
with him! With what happy blushes, what joyful tremors! And now? What
wonder that at the thought a fresh burst of grief convulsed her frame,
or that she presently passed from the extremity of grief to the
extremity of rage, and, realising anew Sir George's heartless desertion
and more cruel perfidy, rubbed her tear-stained face in the dusty chintz
of the window-seat--that had known so many childish sorrows--and there
choked the fierce, hysterical words that rose to her lips?
Or what wonder that her next thought was revenge? She sat up, with her
back to the window and the unkempt garden, whence the light stole
through the disordered masses of her hair; her face to the empty room.
Revenge? Yes, she could punish him; she could take this money from him,
she could pursue him with a woman's unrelenting spite, she could hound
him from the country, she could have all but his life. But none of these
things would restore her maiden pride; would remove from her the stain
of his false love, or rebut the insolent taunt of the eyes to which she
had bowed herself captive. If she could so beat him with his own weapons
that he should doubt his conquest, doubt her love; if she could effect
that, there was no method she would not adopt, no way she would
not take.