“For my pleasure,” she said; “for my amusement, as anybody may see.”
“Whether it is for your amusement or not,” said Dolff, “I am of age, and I have a right to know who is living in my house.”
“In your house!” Her exasperation was growing. “Don’t force me, Dolff, to go into other questions to-night.”
“Whose house is it?” he said. “There’s been no question, because you have kept everything in your hands; but if I am to be driven to it, and claim my rights——”
“Your rights!” she cried, again repeating his words. “Was it one of your rights to knock down a man like a coward from behind? It appears this is what you think you may be permitted to do with impunity—to have your home searched in every corner and to destroy all that I have been doing for years, and to bring shame and disgrace to a house that I have kept free of shame, almost at the risk of my life!”
“I did not,” cried Dolff, interrupting her eagerly. “I did not knock him down from behind. I had not time to think. I let fly at him as I passed. It’s a lie to say I knocked him down from behind.”
“You did the same thing; you took him unawares. And you dare to question me! You killed a man at my door—or meant to do it—and never breathed a word to warn us, to keep us from the disgrace——”
Dolff was not clever enough to know what to say. His snort of rage was not attended by any force of bitter words. He only could repeat, with rage and incompetence,
“At your door?”
“Perhaps,” said Mrs. Harwood, half carried away by passion, half influenced by the dismay which she knew she had it in her power to call forth, “it would be better, since you are exact, to say at your father’s door.”