"Because I love him. Why he married you, how he married you, I do not know; but I believe that you trapped him into----"
"Trapped him, indeed!" shouted Mrs. Paslow. "I could have married a dozen better men than he. He is a coward--a milksop--a--a thief! Ah!" she cried as Beatrice recoiled with a shudder, "you know the truth now. This dainty, well-born gentleman--this honourable man--is a thief, who was tried for shoplifting."
"And who was acquitted," said Paslow, deadly pale. "It was you who were condemned, and rightly: God forgive me for saying so. After all, bad as you are, you are my wife."
"Vivian," said Beatrice, with her face drawn with agony, "is what this woman says true?"
"True--quite true. And I'll thank you to speak of me more respectfully," snapped Mrs. Paslow.
"Is it true?" asked Beatrice again, paying no attention to this spiteful speech.
"Quite true," said Vivian, drawing a long breath and prepared to face the worst; "this is the power she has held over me. That she can send me to prison is a lie; but she can disgrace my name, by telling my friends that I was accused of shoplifting."
"But was it not in the papers?" asked Beatrice anxiously.
"No. I was accused under another name, Beatrice. I married that woman"--he pointed to Mrs. Paslow, who was still fuming with rage--"when my father was alive. She was the daughter of our old servant, who became a shepherd. Afterwards, when a child, and when I was a child, she came here, and Mrs. Lilly helped her for the sake of her father. I was a boy and foolish. She was clever and unscrupulous. She grew weary of this quiet life, and went to town. I thought that I loved her----"
"And you did," panted Mrs. Paslow.