Eweretta turned her face away to hide the agony of despair that convulsed it.
“From now you will not walk in the garden,” went on Alvin, “you will walk only in the wood. If I liberate you now, from this room, will you promise to behave reasonably? You will always be well treated so long as you behave reasonably, and make no attempt to cross my purposes. You know the consequences of your wild outbursts. They drive me to drink.”
She turned and faced him.
“What a coward you are!” she exclaimed fiercely.
Then he struck her.
She did not cry out, though the pain was well-nigh intolerable.
“Coward! Coward!” she repeated.
He went out and left her, locking the door.
She paced the room, backwards and forwards like a caged animal, till the sun set and darkness came. Then she crouched upon the floor, her head in her hands.
A dull, unfeeling apathy was upon her. She no longer struggled. She was faint for want of food, for she had refused what Mrs. Breton had offered her both at breakfast and luncheon, believing—and with good reason—that her food and drink were drugged.