“It was not so, my friend.”
“What did that matter? One does not scruple a lie for a friend, you know! I could not go into all the little details of your perfidies. I could not make her understand during one short and rather agonizing interview how you had allowed yourself to be talked out of your love for me by English propriety even before you had seen her beautiful eyes. There was no reason why I should tell her all my disgrace—anxious as I was to be of service. Besides, as I put it, she was sure to be better pleased. But I did tell her how unwillingly you had spared me an hour of your company;—what a trouble I had been to you;—how you would have shirked me if you could!”
“Winifrid, that is untrue.”
“That wretched journey to Lowestoft was the great crime. Mr. Roger Carbury, who I own is poison to me—”
“You do not know him.”
“Knowing him or not I choose to have my own opinion, sir. I say that he is poison to me, and I say that he had so stuffed her mind with the flagrant sin of that journey, with the peculiar wickedness of our having lived for two nights under the same roof, with the awful fact that we had travelled together in the same carriage, till that had become the one stumbling block on your path to happiness.”
“He never said a word to her of our being there.”
“Who did then? But what matters? She knew it;—and, as the only means of whitewashing you in her eyes, I did tell her how cruel and how heartless you had been to me. I did explain how the return of friendship which you had begun to show me, had been frozen, harder than Wenham ice, by the appearance of Mr. Carbury on the sands. Perhaps I went a little farther and hinted that the meeting had been arranged as affording you the easiest means of escape from me.”
“You do not believe that.”
“You see I had your welfare to look after; and the baser your conduct had been to me, the truer you were in her eyes. Do I not deserve some thanks for what I did? Surely you would not have had me tell her that your conduct to me had been that of a loyal, loving gentleman. I confessed to her my utter despair;—I abased myself in the dust, as a woman is abased who has been treacherously ill-used, and has failed to avenge herself. I knew that when she was sure that I was prostrate and hopeless she would be triumphant and contented. I told her on your behalf how I had been ground to pieces under your chariot wheels. And now you have not a word of thanks to give me!”
“Every word you say is a dagger.”
“You know where to go for salve for such skin-deep scratches as I make. Where am I to find a surgeon who can put together my crushed bones? Daggers, indeed! Do you not suppose that in thinking of you I have often thought of daggers? Why have I not thrust one into your heart, so that I might rescue you from the arms of this puny, spiritless English girl?” All this time she was still seated, looking at him, leaning forward towards him with her hands upon her brow. “But, Paul, I spit out my words to you, like any common woman, not because they will hurt you, but because I know I may take that comfort, such as it is, without hurting you. You are uneasy for a moment while you are here, and I have a cruel pleasure in thinking that you cannot answer me. But you will go from me to her, and then will you not be happy? When you are sitting with your arm round her waist, and when she is playing with your smiles, will the memory of my words interfere with your joy then? Ask yourself whether the prick will last longer than the moment. But where am I to go for happiness and joy? Can you understand what it is to have to live only on retrospects?”
“I wish I could say a word to comfort you.”
“You cannot say a word to comfort me, unless you will unsay all that you have said since I have been in England. I never expect comfort again. But, Paul, I will not be cruel to the end. I will tell you all that I know of my concerns, even though my doing so should justify your treatment of me. He is not dead.”
“You mean Mr. Hurtle.”
“Whom else should I mean? And he himself says that the divorce which was declared between us was no divorce. Mr. Fisker came here to me with tidings. Though he is not a man whom I specially love—though I know that he has been my enemy with you—I shall return with him to San Francisco.”
“I am told that he is taking Madame Melmotte with him, and Melmotte’s daughter.”
“So I understand. They are adventurers—as I am, and I do not see why we should not suit each other.”
“They say also that Fisker will marry Miss Melmotte.”
“Why should I object to that? I shall not be jealous of Mr. Fisker’s attentions to the young lady. But it will suit me to have someone to whom I can speak on friendly terms when I am back in California. I may have a job of work to do there which will require the backing of some friends. I shall be hand-and-glove with these people before I have travelled half across the ocean with them.”
“I hope they will be kind to you,” said Paul.
“No;—but I will be kind to
