Pity, or some other motive, unnerved his arm—he could not just then do the deed; but hurling her from him, threw her to the other side of the cabin, like a reptile that he hated.
In an instant she was on her feet—a rifle was in her hand, and it was pointed in deadly aim at her vile oppressor. The gun Cross had not noticed—it always stood loaded; for Margaret (or Meg as she was called) lived alone, and in that wild place had learned how to use it. He had no idea that the poor worm he had so long trodden upon could ever turn against him; but when he beheld her eyes glaring with fury, and the deadly weapon levelled at his breast, his blood curdled at his heart. He made a step towards her.
'One step more, and you are dead!'
'Put that down, Meg; I don't want to hurt you.' The poor craven now began to cower, and thought that a few soft words would obliterate a life of abuse, carried to a point where woman's love turns to the direst hate.
'No, never! Stir but one foot—move but a single limb—and you will lie beside that wretched victim of your hellish arts. Hear me now, David Cross; I am no longer your slave. You have ruined my name; you have defrauded me of the title of wife; you have made me disown my child; you have kept me in poverty, and made me a companion of outcasts; and now you have thrust me from you, like a hideous reptile—but your hour has come; that miserable being, whom you sent here a raving maniac, has let out your secret—it is already on the wings of the wind.'
Cross trembled in every joint; a fiend, with demoniac power, seemed glaring at him in the being whom but a moment before he had so shamefully abused.
'Meg, forgive me. I have wronged you; I know I have. Don't take my life, and I will make it all right. I will say you are my wife; I will do anything you want.'
'Forgive you? Yes, I will forgive you, when you bring back my poor parents who went down to the grave mourning for her you ruined; when you can tear from my mind the memory of wrongs none but a woman's heart could ever have borne so long. Forgive you? no, never. Your life you may have! but go—before the dreadful feelings which have been burning in my heart blaze up again. Go! go quick—'
He waited not, but moved to the door, stepped trembling from the threshold, and hurried away through the dark forest.
The moment Cross had gone Margaret opened a small trunk, hastily gathered together a few articles of dress, and slipping a little roll of paper containing her stock of money into her pocket, tied up her clothing in a bundle, cast one look upon the dead body, and then quitted the wretched tenement she had so long called her home, firmly resolved never to enter it again.