to do it, I'll do it. I've got my proofs and my
witnesses, and I'm all right. The people of your own house are
witnesses. And there are ever so many more."

"Woman!" cried the captain, "don't you say another word! And don't you
ever dare to speak to me again! I'm not going away, and my niece is not
going away; and I assure you that I hate and despise you so much that
all the law in the world couldn't make me marry you. Although you know
as well as I do that all you've been saying has no sense or truth in
it."

Miss Port did not get angry. With wonderful self-repression she
controlled her feelings. She knew that if she lost that control there
would be an end to everything. She grew pale, but she spoke more gently
than before. "You know"--she was about to say "John," but she thought
she would better not--"that what I say about determination and all
that, I simply say because you do not come to meet me half-way, as I
would have you do. All I want is to get you to acknowledge my rights, to
defend me from ridicule. You know that I am now alone in the world, and
have no one to look to but you--to whom I always expected to look when
father died--and if you should carry out your cruel words, and should
turn from me as if I was a stranger and a nobody, after all these years
of visitin' and attention from you, which everybody knows about, and has
talked about, I could never expect anybody else--you bein' gone--to step
forward--"

At this the face of the captain cleared, and as he gazed upon the
unpleasant face and figure of this weather-worn spinster, the idea that
any one with matrimonial intentions should "step forward," as she put
it, struck him as being so extremely ludicrous that he burst out
laughing.

Then leaped into fire every nervelet of Miss Maria Port. "Laugh at me,
do you?" cried she. "I'll give you something to laugh at! And if you 're
going to stand up for that thing you have in your house, that
murderess--"

She said no more. The captain stepped up to her with a smothered curse
so that she moved back, frightened. But he did nothing. He was too
enraged to speak. She was a woman, and he could not strike her to the
ground. Before her sallow venom he was helpless. He was a man and she
was a woman, and he could do nothing at all. He was too angry to stay
there another second, and, without a word, he left her, walking with
great strides toward the town.

Miss Maria Port stood looking after him, panting a little,