She looked at him, but he made no movement.
“You will have to excuse me, Mr. Essex,” she said, moving toward the door, “but if you won’t go I must.”
The expected had happened. He sprang before her and locked the door. Leaning his back against it, he stared at her. Both were now very pale.
“No,” he said, hearing his own voice shaken by his rapid breathing, “you’re not going. I’ve not said half I came to say. I’ve not come to-day to plead and sue like a beggar for the love that you’re ready to give one day and take back the next. I’ve other things to talk about.”
“Open the door,” she commanded; “open the door and let me out. I want to hear nothing that you have to say.”
“Don’t you want to hear who you are?” he asked.
The words passed through Mariposa like a current of electricity. Every nerve in her body seemed to tighten. She looked at him, staring and repeating:
“Hear who I am?”
“Yes,” he said, leaning toward her while one hand still gripped the door-handle; “hear what your real name is, and who you are? Hear who your father was and where you were born?”
Her face blanched under his eyes. The sight pleased him, suggesting as it did weakness and fear that would give him back his old ascendancy. Horror invaded her. He, of all people on earth, to know! She could say nothing; could hardly think; only seemed a thing of ears to hear.