"Attend to my words," he said, "they may be the last that will ever pass between us. There is ruin on all sides of me. Whom should I trust, if not you? Once more I ask if you will obey me."
"In everything," said Phœbe, "except—"
He did not allow her to finish.
"Except in the way I wish. I will put an end to this. You walk like a ghost about the house. I see you in my dreams. You come, you and your mother, who was like you, a pale, sickly creature, and stand by my bedside in the night. I saw her a few minutes since, and I will submit to it no longer. I will rid myself of you both, now and for ever! Again, will you obey me?"
"Not in the way you wish," replied Phœbe.
"In what other way can you satisfy me? You know well in no other way. You will not?"
"I will not."
With all his strength—with more than his ordinary strength, for he was excited to a furious pitch—he struck her in the face.
"Will you obey me?"
"No."