"Sandy, Sandy!" she cried, stepping impetuously a pace nearer. "Do you, too--do you _dare_ think me so base--me, when at Naples I would not even let you stay--you whom I longed to speak with? Ah, how unjust!--how mean! how cruel! And now, when I am almost friendless, you who professed so much--_you_ are the first to turn from me." Indeed, he was turning, and his face was growing very white again--his eyes were gazing anywhere but at her, and she saw it, and with both her firm little hands seized his left arm as though to turn him back. "Sandy, you _shall_ hear me, for I'm desperate, starving, and that man, he--he tells me I lied to him; and I did, I did lie--_for you_! He talks to me of a--settlement--of sending me home. Why, I _have_ no home! I have no father. My own was buried years ago. I have no mother, for she has no thought but for him--who has disgraced us all and robbed Major Dwight of thousands and dared to threaten me--_me_, because the major would not send more. Oh, you _shall_ listen! It's for the last time, Sandy, and you _shall_ know the truth! Oh, how _can_ you so humiliate a woman who--who----_Look_ at me, Sandy, look, oh, my soldier boy, and see for yourself! They robbed me of you, my heart's darling! They stole every letter. They never let me see you, and they----Oh, you think this the old worn-out story of the cruel parent and the suffering child, but I _will_ convince you!" And now her hands quit their hold upon his arm and tore at the bosom of her dainty gown--tore it open to the filmy lace and ribbon underneath--tore off the driving glove from her right hand, hurling it to the ground, and then the slim, nervous little fingers went burrowing within. "You _dare_ doubt I love you!" she cried, and now her eyes were ablaze, her rich, red lips were parted, her breath came panting through the pearly gate, her young bosom was heaving like a troubled sea. "I told you I had burned your letters--such as I had. They burned them for me, but they could not burn your picture--_I_ did that--I, with my mad kisses, Sandy!" And from its warm nest she drew it, the very one he had given her in Manila, the brave, boyish face in its tiny frame of gold, moist and blurred as though indeed her lips, her tears, had worn it dim. "You will not look?" though one quick glance he shot, then, with the blood surging through his veins, he turned again and covered his eyes with his arm. "Then hear--this--and this," and long, passionately, repeatedly she kissed the senseless, unresponsive counterfeit, and then, letting it hang by its slender chain, once more seized his arm and burst into a passion of tears. Then suddenly, fiercely, she thrust him aside, turned, started swiftly away, took but four tottering steps and, finally, almost as she did the day of the drive, toppled headlong.