say, my interference. It was your right to rule as you
chose, and my meddling was a far worse offence than Eunane's malice.
But it was not _that_ you felt too deeply to reprove."

"True! Eunane hurt me a little; but I expected no such misjudgment
from you. By the touch that proved your alarm I know that I gave no
cause for it."

"How so?" she asked in surprise.

"You laid your hand instinctively on my _left_ arm, the one your
people use. Had I made the slightest angry gesture, you would have
held back my _right_. Had I deserved that Eveena should think so ill
of me--think me capable of doing such dishonour to her presence and to
my own roof, which should have protected an equal enemy from that
which you feared for a helpless girl? For what you would have checked
was such a blow as men deal to men who can strike back; and the hand
that had given it would have been unfit to clasp man's in friendship
or woman's in love. You yourself must have shrunk from its touch."

She caught and held it fast to her lips.

"Can I forget that it saved my life? I don't understand you at all,
but I see that I have frozen your heart. I did fancy for one moment
you would strike, as passionate men and women often do strike
provoking girls, perhaps forgetting your own strength; and I knew you
would be miserable if you did hurt her--in that way. The next moment I
was ashamed, more than you will believe, to have wronged you so. Like
every man, from the head of a household to the Arch-Judge or the
Campta, you must rule by fear. But your wrath _will_ 'stand to cool;'
and you will hate to make a girl cry as you would hate to send a
criminal to the electric-rack, the lightning-stroke, or the
vivisection-table. And, whatever you had done, do you fancy that I
could shrink from you? I said, 'If you weary of your flower-bird you
must strike with the hammer;' and if you could do so, do you think I
should not feel for your hand to hold it to the last?"

"Hush, Eveena! how can I bear such words? You might forgive me for any
outrage to you: I doubt your easily forgetting cruelty to another. I
have not a heart like yours. As I never failed a friend, so I never
yet forgave a foe. Yet even I might pardon one of those girls an
attempt to poison myself, and in some circumstances I might even learn
to like her better afterwards. But I doubt if I could ever touch again
the hand that had mixed the poison for another, though that other were
my mortal enemy."