"They are lies!" she echoed, dazed.
For just a moment he hesitated, perplexed, perhaps almost doubting. He stood before her with a face almost as white as her own.
"Will you swear before God, your Maker, that this is the truth, and nothing but the truth?"
She stood before him, with her eyes still fixed on his.
"I swear before God, my Maker, that this is the—No! No! I will not!" she cried hysterically. "I will not! It is all some trick, some cowardly trap! Who are you—who are you, to degrade me in this way? Who are you, that I must answer to you as to a judge? You are detaining me here; you are holding me a prisoner against my will!"
He held up his hand restrainingly.
"Yes, who are you?" she went on wildly, catching ludicrously at ineffectual trifles, as the drowning do. "Who, indeed, are you? You, with your pharasaical long face and your own underhand schemes? You, closeted alone with married women—with a woman who has made a fool of herself for you, who can't even hide her infatuation! Who are you, who have come into a home and stolen an honorable wife's love away from her husband—who are you to sit up and prate of honor and honesty?"
Again he threw up his hand, as though to ward back her termagancy, but she was not to be stopped.
"Yes, who are you to sit in judgment on me, a woman, alone in the world, a woman who has asked nothing of you! If you are so immaculate," she mocked, "if you are so above suspicion, denounce me as the thief you have said I am! Denounce me; but do not forget that you yourself will soon stand before the world in your true colors!"
He tried to silence her, but her passionate torrent was not to be stayed.