“I could not help it. I was obliged to come. Pray, pray, Miriam, hear me now.”
“Mr Lister!” she said, with a look of contempt that should have driven him away—“Mr Lister! and once more here?”
“Miriam,” he exclaimed, “you drive me to distraction. Do you think that such a love as mine is to be crushed?”
“Love!” she said, looking: at him contemptuously.
“Yes; love,” he cried. “I’ll prove to you my love by saying that now—even now, knowing what I do, I will forgive the past, and will try to save you from disgrace.”
“Mr Lister, you force me to listen to you,” she replied, “for I will not degrade you by ringing for the servants and having you removed. Pray say what you mean. Hush, Antony, let him speak. Perhaps after he has said all he wishes, he may leave me in peace.”
“Leave you in peace—you will not degrade me!” he cried, stung to madness and despair by her looks and words. “Look here, Miriam Carr, you compel me to speak as I do before this wretched boy.”
“Hush, Antony, be silent,” she cried, as I started up, stung in my turn by his contemptuous tone.
“Yes: sit down, spaniel, lap-dog—miserable cur!” he cried; and I felt my teeth grit together with such a sensation of rage a as I had never known before. “And now, as for you—you blind, foolish woman,” he continued, as I awakened to the fact that he had been drinking heavily, “since fair means will not succeed, foul means shall.”
“Say what you wish to say, Mr Lister,” she replied coldly, “for I warn you that this is the last time you shall speak to me. If you force yourself into my presence again, my servants shall hand you over to the police.”