This was said with such an air of quiet indifference, that he paused to look at her, as if he could read on her brow a confirmation of what she said.
"I do not love you then!" he said bitterly. "I have not loved you for two years .... not saying; a word about it .... loving you in secret .... seeing others more favoured, seeing others looking into your face as I dare not look .... suffering tortures of jealousy .... I do not take the way to gain your love! what way should I then take?"
"Be amiable .... women are not captivated by scowls .... George, you are unjust to me. Sit down, and listen to me calmly. Remember my position."
"You take care I shall not forget it."
"Would you then forget it?"
"Yes; for it keeps you from me. It is in your mouth at all times. 'My position' is your excuse for everything."
"And is it not a valid excuse?"
"No; it is not: it is a mere excuse. Remember your position, indeed! why do you love another man than your husband, if your position forbids it?"
She looked at him in surprise, but even her tiger eyes quailed beneath the savage glance of her brutal lover. She felt that he was her master! He was not to be led as Marmaduke had been led, because in him there was none of the generous principle, or chivalric sensibility, which made Marmaduke, in spite of his impetuosity, pliable and manageable. He had almost as much vehemence, and infinitely more brutality. She saw all this; yet she loved him. Strange paradox of human nature, she loved the fierce, narrow-minded, ungenerous Maxwell, with a far deeper passion than she had felt for the generous, open-hearted, high-spirited Marmaduke! It may be that she felt more sympathy with a being of a lower order; or it may be that Maxwell alone had conquered her: certain it is, that she felt for him another kind of passion, and was more his slave than he hers. By a not uncommon transposition of places, he, who as an unacknowledged lover had been the most abject slave, became, when acknowledged, the most unflinching tyrant. This is generally the case with brute natures.
It is not to be supposed that she submitted quietly. She was too fond of power to relinquish it without a struggle; but although ridicule was a weapon she wielded with unsparing skill, and a weapon he dreaded more than any other; yet even that was but a small sword which was beaten down by the heavy sabre of his fierce sarcasm.