"I will keep it and ask Mr. Ingledew or Mr. Evandale. You were pouring from it into the medicine that Mr. Ingledew gave me—for what purpose you know, not I."
A gasp issued from Flossy's pale lips. Her danger was clear to her now.
"Give it back to me!" she said. "I will have it—I tell you I will!"
Enid's hand was frail and slight; not for one moment could she have resisted Mrs. Vane's superior strength—for Flossy could be strong when occasion called for strength—and she did not try. With a quick sweep of her arm she hurled the little bottle into the grate! It broke into fragments as it fell, the crash striking painfully on the ear in the stillness of the night. The two women looked into each other's faces; and then Flossy quailed and fell back a step or two.
"What good or harm will that do?" she asked slowly. "Why did you break it?"
"Better for it to be broken than used for others' harm."
"How do you know that it was meant to do harm?"
"I don't know it; I feel it—I am sure of it. If you lie and cheat and rob, where will you stop short? Is it likely that I of all people can trust you?"
Florence caught at the bed as if for support. She was trembling violently; but her face had all its old malignancy as she said—
"You are going to slander me to your uncle, I suppose? Every one knows that you would gain if I—I and little Dick were out of the way!"