"Very pretty!" he said.
He heard the fellow murmur:
"This is hardly the place--we'll go to the study, if you don't mind."
And they both passed him through the curtain opening. In the little
room to which he followed them, Irene stood by the open window, and the
'fellow' close to her by a big chair. Soames pulled the door to behind
him with a slam; the sound carried him back all those years to the day
when he had shut out Jolyon--shut him out for meddling with his affairs.
"Well," he said, "what have you to say for yourselves?"
The fellow had the effrontery to smile.
"What we have received to-day has taken away your right to ask. I should
imagine you will be glad to have your neck out of chancery."
"Oh!" said Soames; "you think so! I came to tell you that I'll divorce
her with every circumstance of disgrace to you both, unless you swear to
keep clear of each other from now on."
He was astonished at his fluency, because his mind was stammering and
his hands twitching. Neither of them answered; but their faces seemed to
him as if contemptuous.
"Well," he said; "you--Irene?"
Her lips moved, but Jolyon laid his hand on her arm.
"Let her alone!" said Soames furiously. "Irene, will you swear it?"
"No."
"Oh! and you?"
"Still less."
"So then you're guilty, are you?"
"Yes, guilty." It was Irene speaking in that serene voice, with that
unreached air which had maddened him so often; and, carried beyond
himself, he cried:
"You are a devil"
"Go out! Leave this house, or I'll do you an injury."
That fellow to talk of injuries! Did he know how near his throat was to
being scragged?
"A trustee," he said, "embezzling trust property! A thief, stealing his
cousin's wife."
"Call me what you like. You have chosen your part, we have chosen ours.
Go out!"
If he had brought a weapon Soames might have used it at that moment.
"I'll make you pay!" he said.
"I shall be very happy."
At that deadly turning of the meaning of his speech by the son of him
who had nicknamed him 'the man of property,' Soames stood glaring. It
was ridiculous!
There they were, kept from violence by some secret force. No blow
possible, no words to meet the case. But he could not, did not know how
to turn and go away. His eyes fastened on Irene's face--the last time he
would ever see that fatal face--the last time, no doubt!
"You," he said suddenly, "I hope you'll treat him as you treated
me--that's all."