"My bad heart!"
"Aye, your bad heart. Well for you that you are a harmless girl and not a boy, or you would have followed quick in your father's steps and built yourself up as hateful a name."
"I, a harmless girl?"
"Yes, a harmless girl. Your hands are feeble, and however malicious your heart, you can do none a mischief, save your own self."
"You are sure of that?"
"Mercifully it is so. The will to hurt and ruin may be present, but you are weak and powerless to do the harm you would."
"Is a woman so powerless?"
"Certainly."
She ran up a couple of steps, caught him by the shoulders, stooped, and kissed him on the lips, before he was aware what she was about to do.
"Say that again! A woman is weak! A woman cannot ravage and burn, and madden and wound—not with a sword and a firebrand, but——"