"I shall lose no time. I shall see Mrs. Walraven immediately after breakfast."
"But she is ill."
"Bosh! She's shamming. She's afraid to show her wicked, plotting face. She's lying there to concoct some new villainy. I won't spare her—she didn't spare you. I'll send her packing, bag and baggage, before the week's out."
"And if she refuses to go, guardy?"
"Then," cried Mr. Walraven, with flashing eyes, "I'll make her go. I'll have a divorce, by Heaven! She'll find she can't commit high felonies in this enlightened age and go unpunished. I'd see her boiled alive before I'd ever live with her again."
With which spirited declaration Mr. Walraven finished his breakfast and arose. His first proceeding was to ring the bell violently. One of the kitchen damsels answered.
"Go to Mrs. Walraven's room and tell her Mr. Walraven is coming to see her."
The girl, looking rather surprised, hastened to obey.
Mr. Walraven took a turn or two up and down the room, "nursing his wrath to keep it warm."
"The more I think of this infernal business, Mollie," he burst out, "the more enraged I get. If Doctor Oleander was so madly in love with you that he carried you off to prevent your marrying any one else, one might find some excuse for him. Love, we all know, is a 'short-lived madness.' But for her, a woman, to invent that diabolical scheme in cold blood, simply because she hated you! Oh, it was the work of an accursed harridan, and never to be forgiven!"