The scorn with which he spoke the last two words drove Leonard Dowson to frenzy.
"Why? Why not? You never loved her—you never knew how to treat her. You made her miserable, you let her see you thought her inferior to you, not good enough for you ... you wouldn't dismiss that woman you had to help you though you knew To—your wife hated her...."
He was lashing himself to greater and greater fury at the thought of Toni's sufferings.
"Even when you'd made her so wretched that she was ready to die, she still thought of you. She knew I loved her as she deserved to be loved, and she was coming away with me, not because she loved me, but because she thought by leaving you she'd set you free—free to divorce her, to cast her off, to marry someone else, for all I know—some lady whom you'd perhaps be pleased to call your equal."
Beneath his savage indictment even Owen stood dumb. There is always something electrifying about absolute sincerity, and no one, listening, could possibly doubt that the man was speaking from the very depth of his soul.
As he stood panting, glaring at Owen with hatred in his eyes, Herrick stepped forward with a question.
"Excuse me, sir"—neither of them knew, as yet, the name of the visitor—"may I ask how you became possessed of all this information? I am perfectly sure that Mrs. Rose herself has not been your informant, but I fail to see——in the first place, may we ask your name?"
"My name is Dowson, Leonard Dowson." He spoke defiantly. "And as to who told me, well, it doesn't much matter, that I can see, but it was a friend of—of Mrs. Rose." He dared not again call her "Toni."
"A friend?" In one sickening flash of intuition, Herrick knew who had been Toni's evil genius. He stopped short, physically incapable of questioning further; but Owen had no such scruples.
"Who is this—friend?" He could not help the sneer; and Herrick paled in the lamplight, fearing yet powerless to avert the answer.