He leant over the bed and held out his hand. Mary put it contemptuously aside. "Never," she said firmly; "neither in this world, nor in the world to come."
"Do you know what you say?" said Mathews, bending over the pillow and doubling his fist in his sister's face, whilst his dark grey eyes emitted a deadly light.
"I am in my senses," returned Mary, with a bitter laugh, "although you have done your best to drive me mad. You need not stamp your foot, nor frown, nor glare upon me like a beast of prey. I defy your malice. What I said I will again repeat; and may my curse and the curse of an offended God cleave to you for ever!"
"I will murder you for those words!" said the fiend, grinding his teeth.
"Death is no punishment. Threaten me, William, with something that I fear. I am helpless, now, but I shall soon be strong and well, and my arm may be a match for the feeble drunkard—the cowardly destroyer of women and children."
"Unhand me, Godfrey Hurdlestone!" roared out the villain, struggling in the powerful grasp of his colleague in guilt. "For by all the fiends of hell! she shall answer for those words!"
"Hold, Mathews! You are mad! I will stab you to the heart if you attempt to touch her."
He spoke to the winds, for throwing him back to the wall, Mathews seized the knife from his hand, and sprang upon his intended victim. Rising slowly up in the bed, with an air of calm solemn grandeur, she held up the pure pale form of the dead child between herself and the murderer.
Not a word was spoken. With an awful curse the man reeled back as if he had been stung by a serpent, and fell writhing upon the floor, and Mary sunk back upon her pillow, and covered her face with her hands, muttering as she did so,—"How strong is innocence! The wicked are like the chaff which the wind scatters abroad. Oh, God, forgive the past, which is no longer in my power; and let the future be spent in thy service. I repent in dust and ashes. Oh, woe is me, for I have sinned!"
Rousing Mathews from the fit into which he had fallen, and in no very enviable state of mind, Godfrey left the chamber, and joined a set of notorious gamblers in the room below.