"To put an end to _me_, perhaps," she cried, thrusting her face close to mine in contemptuous defiance, "for once and for ever!" "At all events," I said, "so far as my own life is concerned. I wish to shut you out from my life from this time forth." "How do you propose to do that?" she asked. "By paying you for it," I replied, shortly. "You will have to bid high." "I am prepared to bid high." "There is not only the question of living," she said, with a dark look, "there is the question of a woman's feelings to be considered. You brought against me a charge of unfaithfulness--you accused me of being a vile woman, of low character and low morals. Do you still believe it?" "I still believe it," I replied. "How brutally manly it is of you to be so plain and concise! I can thank you, at least, for your frankness, liar as you are! You accused me of trumping up a designing untrue story of my life when I first met you, for the purpose of winning your sympathy. Do you still believe it?" "I still believe it." "How can I thank you? I know how I could repay you if I were a man. It is fortunate for you that I am not. You accused me of setting a snare for your son, who knew the true particulars of my life, you said, and who wished to remove the shame I had brought upon your name. My memory is not bad, is it? Do you still believe all this?" "I still believe it!" I think if she could have stabbed or poisoned me, and caused me to die at that moment, she would not have spared me. "Of course," she said, "you have seen your son." "To my grief," I replied, "I have not. I should be happier if I could see him and ask his forgiveness for the injustice I have done him." "The injustice you have done him through me?" "Yes, through you." "It is curious, too, that you have not met him," she said, and I noticed that she was secretly watching my face as she spoke: "you are such a good business man, and you went to America and remained there so long in the hope of finding him." "How do you know that?" I inquired. "How do you know, indeed, that I have been in America all the time I have been absent from England?" My questions warned her that she had made a mistake. "People will talk," she said; "you don't suppose that I have kept my mouth closed, or that other persons have kept theirs, for months, because you took it into your head to run away from me. Upon my word, I was advised by friends to go to a magistrate, and lay the case before him." "You are as good in business matters as I am; in some matters better. You followed your own advice instead of the advice of others, and you did not go to a magistrate. I know your reason." "What was my reason?" "That you, like myself, have no wish to drag our private affairs before the public. Once in the courts you will find it difficult to escape them; to lay your life and character bare to official gaze would not suit you. No, I know how far I am compromised, and I know how far you will go."