“Or else this. If you haven’t written those letters by noon tomorrow, I’m going to go to work on you. And I mean really go to work. I’m going to drive you out of this house or drive you crazy, or both. There’ll be such rows that the neighbors will be calling the police — or I will. But I won’t let them arrest you. I’ll be your ever-loving wife and ask them to put you in the psychiatric ward. And I’ll tell them why.”
Bull’s-eye. A direct hit.
“And then, when I’ve really given you a working over, whether you’re in a padded cell or have decided to run for it, I’ll write your pals, and what a sob story they’ll get from me. I might be able to get even more out of ’em than you could. And don’t try to write them and beat me to the punch, because anything you say now will only make it more convincing when I write — if I have to.”
Conway sat down. He had no breath and the blood was pounding in his head. She was crucifying him, he realized, in the one way she could. And she knew she could.
“All this I’m telling you is just the persuader,” she went on. “I don’t want to have to do it that way. It’ll take time and be a lot of trouble, and I might not get as much out of them as you can. But don’t think I won’t do it if I have to.”
The pounding in his head was lessening. He could think, after a fashion, and he hoped he could speak. But he dared not get up from the chair.
“Don’t try to bluff me, and don’t try to scare me.” His voice sounded steadier than he had expected. “I’ve been all right for over four years. I’ve been perfectly well.” He realized that his voice was rising, and went on more calmly. “You know it as well as I do, so don’t think you’re going to scare me with that line of talk. I don’t scare that easily.”
“No?” She leaned toward him, and he could hardly focus on the finger she pointed. “Look at yourself. You’re sweating like a horse. Your voice is croaking. And you’re so weak in the knees you can’t even stand up.”
She moved away and he no longer had to concentrate on that finger that so frightened and fascinated him, reminding him of some dread, forgotten thing in the past.
She lit a cigarette and looked at him through the lazily curling smoke. “Why do you think I’ve started all these rows the last couple of months?” she said. “Because I wanted to see how sure you were of yourself. And I found out. No matter what I said or did, you kept calm and controlled. All you wanted to do was to get away, to avoid a row — because you were scared. You’ve taken things from me no man in the world would take — no man, that is, who was in his right mind — and sure of it.”