He put out one hand and held her off. She pressed her own lips with her fingers to hold their quivering, and stared at him, miserably.
He rose from the trunk, walked over to the window, and stood there with his back to her, controlling himself and wiping his eyes.
Betsy’s words seemed to echo in her heart as she stood, hesitating and wretched.
“Of the unspoken word you are master. The spoken word is master of you.”
Her breath came fast. “Why has she done this, Irving?” she asked unsteadily.
“That is for you to tell,—if you will,” he answered. His voice was low and thick.
She drew a long sobbing breath. He had pushed her away. He had shrunk from her.
“You blame me, do you, before you have heard a word?” she asked.
“Let’s not have any nonsense, or justification,” he answered, without turning. “Something has occurred which I would have given ten years of my life to prevent.”
The iron entered his listener’s soul. All her body trembled. She did not know that at this very moment he was fighting for her against his own heart; forcing himself to remember her love for him, and the long years of her devotion. A petty, petted woman, he reminded himself, whose shallows he had perceived even as a child; and he controlled the anger against her which filled him; setting a guard upon the tongue that longed to lash her until her pitiful vanity should be dead beyond recall. She stood there, mute, and he continued to stand with his back to her.