“Why did you leave me, Winnie?” he said. “I might be wrong, but what does it matter? I may be wrong again, but I have got what I wanted. I would not have minded much killing the boy for the sake of seeing you and having it out. Let them manage it their own way; it is none of our business. Come back to me, and let them settle it their own way.”
“Never!” cried Winnie, though there was a struggle in her heart. “After doing all the harm you could do to me, do you think you can recall me by ruining my sister? How dare you venture to look me in the face?”
“And I tell you I did not mind what I did to get to see you and have it out with you,” said Percival; “and if that is why you are here, I am glad I did it. What is Mary to me? She must look after herself. But I cannot exist without my wife.”
“It was like that, your conduct drove me away,” said Winnie, with a quiver on her lips.
“It was like it,” said he, “only that you never did me justice. My wife is not like other men’s wives. I might drive you away, for you were always impatient; but you need not think I would stick at anything that had to be done to get you back.”
“You will never get me back,” said Winnie, with flashing eyes. All her beauty had come back to her in that moment. It was the warfare that did it, and at the same time it was the homage and flattery which were sweet to her, and which she could see in everything he said. He would have stuck at nothing to get her back. For that object he would have ruined, killed, or done anything wicked. What did it matter about the other people? There was a sort of magnificence in it that took her captive; for neither of the two had pure motives or a high standard of action, or enough even of conventional goodness to make them hypocrites. They both acknowledged, in a way, that themselves, the two of them, were the chief objects in the universe, and everything else in the world faded into natural insignificance when they stood face to face, and their great perennial conflict was renewed.
“I do not believe it,” said Percival. “I have told you I will stick at nothing. Let other people take care of their own affairs. What have you to do in that weedy den with that old woman? You are not good enough, and you never were meant for that. I knew you would come to me at the last.”
“But you are mistaken,” said Winnie, still breathing fire and flame. “The old woman, as you call her, is good to me, good as nobody ever was. She loves me, though you may think it strange. And if I have come to you it is not for you; it is to ask what you have done, what your horrible motive could be, and why, now you have done every injury to me a man could do, you should try to strike me through my friends.”
“I do not care that for your friends,” said Percival. “It was to force you to see me, and have it out. Let them take care of themselves. Neither man nor woman has any right to interfere in my affairs.”
“Nobody was interfering in your affairs,” cried Winnie; “do you think they had anything to do with it?—could they have kept me if I wanted to go? It is me you are fighting against. Leave Mary alone, and put out your strength on me. I harmed you, perhaps, when I gave in to you and let you marry me. But she never did you any harm. Leave Mary, at least, alone.”