"Have you read it?"
"I have read it."
"Then you know that we understand each other?"
"I know that your brother has sacrificed himself—and that you have taken a base advantage of the sacrifice."
He started, and looked round at me once more. I saw that something in my language, or in my tone of speaking, had stung him.
"You have your privilege as a lady," he said. "Don't push it too far. What Oscar has done, he has done of his own free will."
"What Oscar has done," I rejoined, "is lamentably foolish, cruelly wrong. Still, perverted as it is, there is something generous, something noble, in the motive which has led him. As for your conduct in this matter, I see nothing but what is mean, nothing but what is cowardly, in the motive which has led you."
He started to his feet, and flung his cigar into the empty fireplace.
"Madame Pratolungo," he said, "I have not the honor of knowing anything of your family. I can't call a woman to account for insulting me. Do you happen to have any man related to you, in or out of England?"
"I happen to have what will do equally well on this occasion," I replied. "I have a hearty contempt for threats of all sorts, and a steady resolution in me to say what I think."