n the old flame-like way I used to admire so much in your
girlhood--you are a splendid creature, by Jove! I could find it in my
heart to love you still--there, it is out at last--if it were not for
Mrs. Raymond--" glancing, as he spoke, in the direction of Mrs. Clayton,
with a knowing smile. "It was your magnificent disdain that kindled the
torch before. Beware how you revive that fanaticism of mine!"

I turned for one moment with an involuntary feeling of appeal to Mrs.
Clayton, but her cold, green eyes were quivering in accordance with the
smile that stretched her thin lips to a line of mocking mirth. One
glimpse of sympathy would have carried me to her arms for
refuge--distasteful as she was to me in every way save one. She, like
myself, was a woman. But such perversion of all natural feeling
estranged me from her irreconcilably and forever.

I was alone; shame, humiliation, despair, possessed me; indignation, for
the insult I was forced to bear in her presence, filled my soul--I stood
with my head cast down, tears raining on my bosom, my arms dropped
nervelessly beside me, my hands clinched, my whole frame trembling with
excitement.

Slowly and one by one came those convulsive sobs--that rend and wrench
the physical frame as earthquakes do the earth. Then rose the sudden
resolve--born of volcanic impulse, irresistible to mind as is the
lava-flood to matter, sweeping before it all obstructions of reason,
habit, expediency.

If it cost me my life I would avenge myself on this tiger, thirsting for
my blood; I would anticipate him in his work of destruction, and the
strength of Samson seemed to permeate my frame.

It was strange that at that moment of cold, impetuous energy I forgot
the steel I carried in my bosom, and thought only of the power I bore in
my own hands. I determined to strangle him with my strong, elastic
fingers, of which I knew full well the powerful grasp.

The consequences were as cobwebs in my estimate--compared to the ecstasy
of such revenge--for all this flashed through my brain with the swift
vividness of lightning, and in less than thirty seconds after his last
remark this matter was matured. The woman prevailed over the lady.

I raised my eyes slowly and dashed away my tears, preparatory to the
onset. He was looking at me wonder-struck, and, perhaps, with something
like compunction in his face as I met his gaze. He must have read an
expression that appalled him in those dilated eyes of mi