'I couldna help it, Ed'ard; the signs said go, and then he threw me in the bracken.'
Something broke in Edward's mind. The control of a life-time went from him.
'Why didn't I?' he cried. 'Why didn't I? Good God! To think I suffered and renounced for this!' He laughed. 'And all so simple! Just throw you in the bracken.'
She shuddered at the knife-edge in his voice, and also at the new realization that broke on her that Edward had it in him to be like Reddin.
'What for do you fritten me?' she whispered.
'But it's not too late,' Edward went on, and his face, that had been grey, flushed scarlet. 'No, it's not too late. I'm not particular. You're not new, but you'll do.'
He crushed her to him and kissed her.
'I'm your husband,' he said, 'and from this day on I'll have my due. You've lied to me, been unfaithful to me, made me suffer because of your purity—and you had no purity. Tonight you sleep in my room; you've slept in his.'
'Oh, let me go, Ed'ard! let me go!' She was lost indeed now. For Edward, the righteous and the loving, was no more. Where should she flee? She did not know this man who held her in desperate embrace. He was more terrible to her than all the rest—more terrible, far, than Reddin—for Reddin had never been a god to her.
'I knelt by your bedside and fought my instincts, and they were good instincts. I had a right to them. I gave up more than you can ever guess.'