“Really, madam!” he replied, with cruel intent, “you have not impressed me so!”

I continued unshaken:  “In this conversation it will be necessary to assume that you are responsible for the presence of the disease.”

“In that case,” he replied, haughtily, “I can have no further part in the conversation, and I will ask you to drop it at once.”

I might have taken him at his word and waited, confident that in the end he would have to come and ask for terms.  But that would have seemed childish to me, with the grave matters we had to settle.  After a minute or two, I said, quietly:  “Mr. van Tuiver, you wish me to believe that previous to your marriage you had always lived a chaste life?”

He was equal to the effort it cost to control himself.  He sat examining me with his cold grey eyes.  I suppose I must have been as new and monstrous a phenomenon to him as he was to me.

At last, seeing that he would not reply, I said, coldly:  “It will help us to get forward if you will give up the idea that it is possible for you to put me off, or to escape this situation.”

“Madam,” he cried, suddenly, “come to the point!  What is it that you want?  Money?”

I had thought I was prepared for everything; but this was an aspect of his world which I could hardly have been expected to allow for.  I stared at him and then turned from the sight of him.  “And to think that Sylvia is married to such a man!” I whispered, half to myself.

“Mrs. Abbott,” he exclaimed, “how can anyone understand what you are driving at?”

But I turned away without answering, and for a long time sat gazing over the water.  What was the use of pleading with such a man?  What was the use of pouring out one’s soul to him?  I would tell Sylvia the truth at once, and leave him to her!

25.  I heard him again, at last; he was talking to my back, his tone a trifle less aloof.  “Mrs. Abbott, do you realize that I know nothing whatever about you—­your character, your purpose, the nature of your hold upon my wife?  So what means have I of judging?  You threaten me with something that seems to me entirely insane—­and what can I make of it?  If you wish me to understand you, tell me in plain words what you want.”

I reflected that I was in the world, and must take it as I found it.  “I have told you what I want,” I said; “but I will tell you again, if it is necessary.  I hoped to persuade you that it was your duty to go to your wife and tell her the truth.”

He took a few moments to make sure of his self-possession.  “And would you explain what good you imagine that could do?”

“Your wife,” I said, “must be put in position to protect herself in future.  There is no means of making sure in such a matter, except to tell her the truth.  You love her—­and you are a man who has never been accustomed to do without what he wants.”

“Great God, woman!” he cried.  “Don’t you suppose one blind child is enough?”