"I—don't know. All I know is that she was right and I should have listened to her warning; now I shall never, never respect myself again."
"I see no reason why you shouldn't," said Dalton, a sense of humour overcoming his wrath. "You've done nothing but tell me in polite language to go to the devil."
"You kissed me!"
"What of it? Many women in your position are kissed, and they are in no wise cast down," he laughed sardonically.
"I feel degraded—I feel unfit to kiss my own, dear little baby again!"
"You should have thought of all that when you were so anxious to charm me," he returned cruelly.
"You are a beast, and the most hateful man I know!" She made an attempt in the gloom to crawl away to some distance from him and his rug, but he ordered her to stay where she was, adding,
"I shan't trouble you again. You have nothing to fear from me."
"I don't want to share the same rug!—I wish I was a mile away!"
"The rug has done you no harm. If you prefer it, I'll shift off it. The best thing you can do is to go to sleep."