How hard and defiant was the voice in which Agnes Barker said this—a young girl expressing her first love without a blush, and with that air of cold-blooded defiance. It was terrible!
"Ralph Harrington, he is her son, and a beggar!" cried the woman bitterly.
"I do not understand what force may lie in the first objection, and I do not believe in the second. Ralph cannot be a beggar, while his brother holds so much wealth; at any rate, I love him."
"Love, girl! What have you to do with this sweet poison? The thing Love is not your destiny."
"It is, though, and shall control it," replied Agnes, with the same half-insolent tone; for it seemed to be a relief for this young girl to act out spontaneously the evil of her nature, and she appeared to enjoy the kindling anger of her servant—if that slave woman was her servant—with vicious relish.
The woman walked close to the insolent girl, with her hand clenched, and her lips pressed firmly together.
"Agnes, Agnes—you cannot know how much rests on you—how great a revenge your obstinacy may baffle."
"I know that I love Ralph Harrington, and if it will comfort you to hear it, he does not love me," answered the girl with a burning glow in either cheek.
"Oh, you have come back again—it is his blood on fire in your cheeks. I have no fear of you, Agnes. That blood grows strong with age like old wine, and soon learns to give hatred for unanswered love. I can trust the blood."
"But he shall love me, or, at any rate, no one else shall have what he withholds from me."