She was actually hoarse with passion as she concluded.
“This time, Lady Linton? Then it was your work that other time. You acknowledge it?” said Mrs. Alexander, in a calm tone, and without a trace of excitement in either face or manner.
She was as unruffled as when Lady Linton first met her; she had not even lost a vestige of color. All the change that was visible in her was a half-sorrowful light in her beautiful blue eyes, a grave, pitiful expression about her mouth.
Lady Linton saw instantly that she had made a mistake; in her anger and hatred she had admitted more than was wise or prudent, and she grew very pale.
“I acknowledge nothing; I only warn you,” she said, almost fiercely.
“Lady Linton,” her companion answered composedly, “your threats do not move me; they cannot hurt me, and I fear they will but recoil upon your own head. Believe me, I would much rather be upon friendly terms with you. I feel more like forgiving the injuries of the past than cherishing hostile feelings. I could even at this moment take your hand—the hand that wrote such cruel things of me so many years ago—and say, ‘Let us be at peace;’ but you will not, and I must go my way and leave you to go yours, hoping that before it is too late for repentance to avail you anything, a better spirit may possess you.”
“You defy me then?” said Lady Linton, through tightly closed teeth.
“Oh, no; I do not defy you,” was the pleasant rejoinder. “You are very angry, Lady Linton, because I will not allow myself to be frightened and browbeaten by you, but you will feel differently by and by when you come to consider matters in another light. I would rather do you a kindness than harm, and, by the way, I have a package belonging to you which I mean to return to you very soon.”
“A package belonging to me! Where did you get it?”
“It is one that I have had many years, but I have only recently discovered that it is yours.”