He followed her, and when they had come to the room, hoped that she was quite well again.  Then he sat in a chair by the table and she took a seat opposite him.  She did not reply to his wish for her good health, but waited for him to speak.  She was not sulky, but apparently indifferent.  Her fret and fume were smothered of late.  Now that the supreme injury was inflicted and she had borne a child out of wedlock, Sabina’s frenzies were over.  The battle was lost.  Life held no further promises, and the denial of the great promise that it had offered and taken back again, numbed her.  She was weary of the subject of herself and the child.  She could even ask Mr. Churchouse for books to occupy her mind during convalescence.  Yet the slumbering storm in her soul awoke in full fury before the man had spoken a dozen words.

She looked at Raymond with tired eyes, and he felt that, like himself, she was older, wiser, different.  He measured the extent of her experiences and felt sorry for her.

“Sabina,” he said.  “I must apologise for one mistake.  When I asked you to come back to me and live with me, I did a caddish thing.  It wasn’t worthy of me, or you.  I’m awfully sorry.  I forgot myself there.”

She flushed.

“Can that worry you?” she asked.  “I should have thought, after what you’d already done, such an added trifle wouldn’t have made you think twice.  To ruin a woman body and soul—­to lie to her and steal all she’s got to give under pretence of marriage—­that wasn’t caddish, I suppose—­that wasn’t anything to make you less pleased with yourself.  That was what we may expect from men of honour and right bringing up?”

“Don’t take this line, or we shan’t get on.  If, after certain things happened, I had still felt we—­”

“Stop,” she said, “and hear me.  You’re making my blood burn and my fingers itch to do something.  My hands are strong and quick—­they’re trained to be quick.  I thought I could come to this meeting calm and patient enough.  I didn’t know I’d got any hate left in me—­for you, or the world.  But I have—­you’ve mighty soon woke it again; and I’m not going to hear you maul the past into your pattern and explain everything away and tell me how you came gradually to see we shouldn’t be happy together and all the usual dirty, little lies.  Tell yourself falsehoods if you like—­you needn’t waste time telling them to me.  I’ll tell you the truth; and that is that you’re a low, mean coward and bully—­a creature to sicken the air for any honest man or woman.  And you know it behind your big talk.  What did you do?  You seduced me under promise of marriage, and when your brother heard what you’d done and flung you out of the Mill, you ran to your aunt.  And she said, ’Choose between ruin and no money, and Sabina and money from me.’  And so you agreed to marry me—­to keep yourself in cash.  And then, when all was changed and you found yourself a rich man, you lied again and deserted me, and wronged your child—­ruined us both.  That’s what you did, and what you are.”