“You never drink wine?”

“No, Cassandra.”

“How was the ride down?”

“Delightful.”

“What about the new horse?”

“He is an awful brute.”

“When shall we have a ride with him?”

“When you please.”

The boy came in to say would we please go to the parlor; our room was wanted for supper.  An immediate rush, with loud laughing, took place, for the parlor fire; but Charles and I did not move.  I was busy remaking the bow of my purple silk cravat.

“‘I drink the cup of a costly death,’” Ben hummed, as he sauntered along by us, hands in his pockets—­the last in the room, except us two.

“Indeed, Somers; perhaps you would like this too.”  And Charles offered him his glass of wine.

Ben took it, and with his thumb and finger snapped it off at the stem, tipping the wine over Charles’s hand.

I saw it staining his wristband, like blood.  He did not stir, but a slight smile traveled swiftly over his face.

“I know Veronica,” said Ben, looking at me.  “Has this man seen her?”

His voice crushed me.  What a barrier his expression of contempt made between her and me!

Withal, I felt a humiliating sense of defeat.

Charles read me.

As he folded his wristband under his sleeve, carefully and slowly, his slender fingers did not tremble with the desire that possessed him, which I saw in his terrible eyes as plainly as if he had spoken, “I would kill him.”

They looked at my hands, for I was wringing them, and a groan burst from me.

“Somers,” said Charles, rising and touching his shoulder, “behave like a man, and let us alone; I love this girl.”

His pale face changed, his eyes softened, and mine filled with tears.

“Cassandra,” urged Ben, in a gentle voice, “come with me; come away.”

“Fool,” I answered; “leave me alone, and go.”

He hesitated, moved toward the door, and again urged me to come.

“Go! go!” stamping my foot, and the door closed without a sound.

For a moment we stood, transfixed in an isolation which separated us from all the world beside.

“Now Charles, we”—­a convulsive sob choked me, a strange taste filled my mouth, I put my handkerchief to my lips and wiped away streaks of blood.  I showed it to him.

“It is nothing, by God!” snatching the handkerchief.  “Take mine—­oh, my dear—­”

I tried to laugh, and muttered the imperative fact of joining the rest.

“Be quiet, Cassandra.”

He opened the window, took a handful of snow from the sill and put it to my mouth.  It revived me.

“Do you hear, Charles?  Never say those frightful words again.  Never, never.”

“Never, if it must be so.”

He touched my hand; I opened it; his closed over mine.

“Go, now,” he said, and springing to the window, threw it up, and jumped out.  The boy came in with a tablecloth on his arm, and behind him Ben.