"Deceived her?—deceived you? I do not understand, Christie," he said, coldly.
"Oh, Willard! you do! You promised to love only her—to marry her; yet you deceived her, and married me!"
"Well, a moment ago, you said I deceived you likewise. And how, I pray you, madam? Go on," he said, with a sneer.
"You made me your wife while pledged to another!"
"Which, doubtless, causes you a great deal of sorrow." he said, in a tone of slight pique; for though his passion for Christie was dying away, he could not endure the thought, as yet, of her forgetting him.
"Oh, Willard! you know being your wife is the greatest happiness on earth for me; but when I saw her, last night, so wild, passionate, and despairing, I felt as if I could have died for very shame to think I had been the cause of her misery!"
"Then she did seem despairing!" he said, while his face flushed.
"Oh, yes! almost crazed, mad, frenzied. Her eyes seemed killing me!"
"Who could have told her?—not you?" he exclaimed, suddenly.
"Oh, no—no! I do not know how she heard it; but she knew all."