“Once more—will you clear yourself before me?”
“No.”
“What! ‘No?’”
“No! Alas! why multiply words, when all is contained in that monosyllable?”
“What is the meaning of this, madam?”
“That your three-months wife, even while acknowledging your right to command her, disobeys you, because she must, Philip! she must! but even in so doing, she submits herself to you to meet uncomplainingly all consequences—yes, to say short, they are natural and just! Philip, you have my final answer. Do your will! I am yours!”
And saying this, she arose, and with a manner full of loving submission, went to his side, laid her hand lightly upon his arm and looked up into his face.
But he shook that hand off as if it had been a viper; and when she replaced it, and again looked pleadingly up into his face, he took her by the arm and whirled her off toward the sofa, where she dropped amid the cushions, and then with a fierce, half-arrested oath, he flung himself out of the room.
“I cannot blame him: no one could. Oh, God,” she cried, sinking down and burying her head amid the cushions. Quickly with sudden energy she arose, and went to the window and looked out; the sky was still darker with clouds than with night; but the wind had ceased and the sea was quiet. She returned toward the fireplace and rang the bell, which was speedily answered by Forrest.
Forrest, the son of her old nurse, Aunt Hapsy, was a tall, stalwart, jet-black negro of some fifty years of age, faithfully and devotedly attached to his mistress, and whose favorite vanity it was to boast that—Laws! niggers! he had toted Miss Marget about in his arms, of’en an’ of’en when she was no more’n so high, holding his broad black palm about two feet from the ground.