"Yes, and I will hurt you," she made answer. "I'll hurt you as I've never hurt you yet if you dare to disobey me! I'll crush you to the earth before I will endure that from you. Now! For the last time! Will you write that letter? Think well before you refuse again!"
She towered over Dinah with awful determination, wrought up to a pitch of fury by her resistance that almost bordered upon insanity.
Dinah's boldness waned swiftly before the iron force that countered it. But her resolution remained unshaken, a resolution from which no power on earth could move her.
"I can't do it—possibly," she said.
"You mean you won't?" said Mrs. Bathurst.
Dinah nodded, and gripped the table hard to endure what should follow.
"You—mean—you won't?" Mrs. Bathurst said again very slowly.
"I will not." The white lips spoke the words, and closed upon them. Dinah sat rigid with apprehension.
Mrs. Bathurst took her hand from her shoulder and turned from her. The candle that had been burning all the evening was low in its socket. She lifted it out and went to the fireplace. There were some shavings in the grate. She pushed the lighted candle end in among them; then, as the fire roared up the chimney, she turned.
An open trunk was close to her with the dainty pale green dress that Dinah had worn the previous evening lying on the top. She took it up, and bundled the soft folds together. Then violently she flung it on to the flames.