“If it be wicked, God forgive me! I was wretched enough before—I would fain have never come to life again: and now you almost make me believe that you would have been best pleased if I never had.”
At this moment Hope entered. He had left them in a far different mood: it made him breathless to see his wife’s face of passion, and Margaret’s of woe.
“Hear her!” exclaimed Hester. “She says I should have been glad to have lost her yesterday!”
“Have mercy upon me!” cried Margaret, in excessive agitation. “You oppress me beyond what I can bear. I cannot bear on as I used to do. My strength is gone, and you give me none. You take away what I had!”
“Will you hear me spoken to in this way?” cried Hester, turning to her husband.
“I will.”
Margaret’s emotion prevented her hearing this, or caring who was by. She went on—“You leave me nothing—nothing but yourself—and you abuse my love for you. You warn me against love—against marriage—you chill my very soul with terror at it. I have found a friend in Maria; and you poison my comfort in my friendship, and insult my friend. There is not an infant in a neighbour’s house but you become jealous of it the moment I take it in my arms. There is not a flower in your garden, not a book on my table, that you will let me love in peace. How ungenerous—while you have one to cherish and who cherishes you, that you will have me lonely!—that you quarrel with all who show regard to me!—that you refuse me the least solace, when my heart is breaking with its loneliness! Oh, it is cruel!”
“Will you hear this, Edward?”
“I will, because it is the truth. For once, Hester, you must hear another’s mind; you have often told your own.”
“God knows why I was saved yesterday,” murmured Margaret; “for a more desolate creature does not breathe.”