“You talk as if I was nobody—nothing!” she said, hoarsely.
“You are as nothing to me,” he responded, with no trace of scorn, but with something in his tone that cut her more deeply than any outspoken contempt.
“Oh, I am, am I?” she retorted. “I’ll show you differently presently. Do you think I’m afraid of you? You’d like to kill me—you wish me dead—I know that! I can see it in your face. But I’m not dead, worse luck for you.”
He turned his head slightly. Some one was passing in the lane. The footsteps stopped as if the passerby had heard the words and had paused to listen.
Faradeane raised the lamp. “Good-night, Alford,” he said.
Alford—for it was he—glanced from Faradeane to the dimly-seen figure of the woman with an air of surprise; then, touching his hat, returned the “good-night” with deep respect, and walked on.
“Do you think I’m afraid of you?” she repeated. “You’re mistaken if you do! You’ve got more cause to fear me. You know the secret between us. Drive me too hard with your cursed coldness and I’ll shout it out here and now!” and she raised her clinched fist and shook it at him.
He looked down at her in silence, with an impassive face, but with a strange expression in his eyes; a mixture of loathing and something like pity—the expression a man might wear who looks upon a wild, furious animal.
The look seemed to madden her.
“Why don’t you speak?” she demanded. “Are you going to keep me standing out here any longer. Do you know how long I have been kept waiting by that brute of yours?”