At dinner Leah sat down with me and chattered as usual, without troubling herself about my monosyllabic answers.
I supposed she wished me to credit her with calm confidence and philosophy, while I looked upon it all as brazen impudence.
I hated and despised her. She had inflamed my passions, told me to my face she did not love me, and seemed to claim my respect through it all. Possibly she expected me to be grateful for her remark that she believed me incapable of betraying her to her father.
As she drank my Scopolo she said there were several bottles left, as well as some Muscat.
“I make you a present of it all,” I replied, “it will prime you up for your nocturnal orgies.”
She smiled and said I had had a gratuitous sight of a spectacle which was worth money, and that if I were not going so suddenly she would gladly have given me another opportunity.
This piece of impudence made me want to break the wine bottle on her head. She must have known what I was going to do from the way I took it up, but she did not waver for a moment. This coolness of hers prevented my committing a crime.
I contented myself with saying that she was the most impudent slut I had ever met, and I poured the wine into my glass with a shaking hand, as if that were the purpose for which I had taken up the bottle.
After this scene I got up and went into the next room; nevertheless, in half an hour she came to take coffee with me.
This persistence of hers disgusted me, but I calmed myself by the reflection that her conduct must be dictated by vengeance.