ealth of their foam, for his
face was as white as snow. She saw and understood; but in the madness
upon her she went on trying new places and new ways to wound:

'You thought, I suppose, that this poor, neglected, despised, rejected
woman, who wanted so much to marry that she couldn't wait for a man to
ask her, would hand herself over to the first chance comer who threw his
handkerchief to her; would hand over herself--and her fortune!'

'Oh, Stephen! How can you say such things, think such things?' The
protest broke from him with a groan. His pain seemed to inflame her
still further; to gratify her hate, and to stimulate her mad passion:

'Why did I ever see you at all? Why did my father treat you as a son;
that when you had grown and got strong on his kindness you could thus
insult his daughter in the darkest hour of her pain and her shame!' She
almost choked with passion. There was now nothing in the whole world
that she could trust. In the pause he spoke:

'Stephen, I never meant you harm. Oh, don't speak such wild words. They
will come back to you with sorrow afterwards! I only meant to do you
good. I wanted . . . ' Her anger broke out afresh:

'There; you speak it yourself! You only wanted to do me good. I was so
bad that any kind of a husband . . . Oh, get out of my sight! I wish to
God I had never seen you! I hope to God I may never see you again! Go!
Go! Go!'

This was the end! To Harold's honest mind such words would have been
impossible had not thoughts of truth lain behind them. That Stephen--his
Stephen, whose image in his mind shut out every other woman in the world,
past, present, and future--should say such things to any one, that she
should think such things, was to him a deadly blow. But that she should
say them to him! . . . Utterance, even the utterance which speaks in the
inmost soul, failed him. He had in some way that he knew not
hurt--wounded--killed Stephen; for the finer part was gone from the
Stephen that he had known and worshipped so long. She wished him gone;
she wished she had never seen him; she hoped to God never to see him
again. Life for him was over and done! There could be no more happiness
in the world; no more wish to work, to live! . . .

He bowed gravely; and without a word turned and walked away.

Stephen saw him go, his tall form moving amongst the tree trunks till
finally it was lost in their massing. She was so filled with the tumult
of her