“Honorably!” he sneered. “Honorably! Do you know what it would mean to me to be beaten now? Do you know what it would mean to you! Do you want to go to the poor-house?”
He stopped in his mad rush of words and flung out his jaw at her pugnaciously.
Emily stood trying to hold her husband’s wild, unsteady eyes in her own gaze for a moment.
“Why, Jerome,” she said in low, even accents, “it would be as bad as—as—as that story they told of you in your first campaign!”
His face without relaxing took on the mockery of a smile, then he laughed harshly. The tone of the laugh shuddered through Emily. She had released her hold on him, and now she took a step backward. Her lips were parted and at last she spoke, her words coming reluctantly from her throat. It was scarcely above a whisper that she said:
“Was that all—true?”
She saw the conviction in his eyes before it came to its verification on his lips. He laughed again, the same harsh laugh as before.
“True!” he cried. “Of course it was true, you poor little fool!”
The words brought a cry from her, and, clasping her hands before her face, she turned and sank into the chair and put her head down on the desk.
Garwood stared at her awhile, then took a step toward her. He drew nearer and bent over her, tried to draw her at last up into his arms.