‘From the first, you were infamous. In an evil hour we met; I tried to lift you from the mud, but you were too base. I thought you were dead. I thought that you might have died penitent, and I forgave you. Then, after long years, you rose again, like a ghost from the grave. The shock of your resurrection nearly killed me, but I survived. Then, I remembered your promise—never willingly to molest me; and hearing you had left England, I breathed again. And now you have returned!—Woman, take care! As surely as we are now standing in the Temple of God, so surely will I free myself from you for ever, if you torment me any more.’
He was mad, and scarcely knew what he was saying. Never before in his whole life had he been so carried away by passion. But the woman with whom he had to deal was no coward, and his taunts awoke all the angry resentment in her heart. She tore herself free from his hold, and moved towards the vestry door.
‘You are a brave man,’ she said, ‘to threaten a woman! But the law will protect me from you, and I shall claim my rights!’ Pale as death, he blocked her passage.
‘Let me pass!’ she cried.
‘Not yet. Before you go, you shall tell me what you mean to do!’
‘Never mind,’ she answered, setting her lips together.
‘I will know. Do you mean to proclaim my infamy to the world?’
‘I mean,’ she replied, ‘to prevent you from passing yourself off as a free man, when you are bound to me. Our marriage has never been dissolved; you can never marry another woman, till you are divorced from me.’
He threw his arms up into the air, and uttered a sharp despairing cry:
‘O God, my God!’