Bessy was looking at him coldly, under the half-dropped lids of indifference. "I hardly know what you mean—you use such peculiar words; but I don't see why you should expect me to give up all the ideas I was brought up in. Our standards are different—but why should yours always be right?"
"You believed they were right when you married me—have they changed since then?"
"No; but——" Her face seemed to harden and contract into a small expressionless mask, in which he could no longer read anything but blank opposition to his will.
"You trusted my judgment not long ago," he went on, "when I asked you to give up seeing Mrs. Carbury——"
She flushed, but with anger, not compunction. "It seems to me that should be a reason for your not asking me to make other sacrifices! When I gave up Blanche I thought you would see that I wanted to please you—and that you would do something for me in return...."
Amherst interrupted her with a laugh. "Thank you for telling me your real reasons. I was fool enough to think you acted from conviction—not that you were simply striking a bargain——"
He broke off, and they looked at each other with a kind of fear, each hearing between them the echo of irreparable words. Amherst's only clear feeling was that he must not speak again till he had beaten down the horrible sensation in his breast—the rage of hate which had him in its grip, and which made him almost afraid, while it lasted, to let his eyes rest on the fair weak creature before him. Bessy, too, was in the clutch of a mute anger which slowly poured its benumbing current around her heart. Strong waves of passion did not quicken her vitality: she grew inert and cold under their shock. Only one little pulse of self-pity continued to beat in her, trembling out at last on the cry: "Ah, I know it's not because you care so much for Westmore—it's only because you want to get away from me!"
Amherst stared as if her words had flashed a light into the darkest windings of his misery. "Yes—I want to get away..." he said; and he turned and walked out of the room.
He went down to the smoking-room, and ringing for a servant, ordered his horse to be saddled. The foot-man who answered his summons brought the afternoon's mail, and Amherst, throwing himself down on the sofa, began to tear open his letters while he waited.
He ran through the first few without knowing what he read; but presently his attention was arrested by the hand-writing of a man he had known well in college, and who had lately come into possession of a large cotton-mill in the South. He wrote now to ask if Amherst could recommend a good manager—"not one of your old routine men, but a young fellow with the new ideas. Things have been in pretty bad shape down here," the writer added, "and now that I'm in possession I want to see what can be done to civilize the place"; and he went on to urge that Amherst should come down himself to inspect the mills, and propose such improvements as his experience suggested. "We've all heard of the great things you're doing at Westmore," the letter ended; and Amherst cast it from him with a groan....