And Martin Valliant went from them into the darkness like a broken man carrying a curse.
John Falconer had cleared the men from the room, and set his torch in a rusty bracket on the wall, where it threw a wayward, draughty flare upon his face. Mellis stood by the window with her back turned to him, rigid, motionless, her hands at her throat.
“There will come a time when you will thank me for this.”
She was struggling for self-mastery, and against the bitter shame that they had thrust upon her, while her heart had gone out into the darkness with Martin Valliant, and in a way she was desperate, robbed of her love. She might have come through her anguish in silence had John Falconer been less of a dull and jealous fool.
“Now get you to bed, child; there will be peace in this house.”
“Peace!”
She flashed around on him with generous fury.
“Peace—for me, when you have treated me as though I were a harlot? Oh, you blind fools, you souls full of foul imaginings! That man was a saint, white as God’s own self. And you have robbed me of such a love as a man but seldom gives to a woman. Yes, he could have taken that sword and given death to many of your curs, but there was a nobleness, a humility, that did not touch you. He knew what was in your hearts, that you hated him, were jealous, breathed foul lies. He besought me to let him go. And I—I bade him stay. I would that he had taken all that a woman has to give; yes, my very body and soul. There is the truth; I fling it in your face, John Falconer, you sour and godly and grudging hound!”
Her anger scorched him like a flame. He answered her hoarsely.
“It was for your sake I did it. For you are precious to us.”