When
things went wrong, you scratched. You don't deserve the name of woman.
What you've done is as bad as murder."
"I did it for Angelo," Marie pleaded. "I love him so! I couldn't lose
his love."
"So you flung Mary to the wolves!" Vanno said. He had not believed that
he could see a woman cry without pitying and wishing to help her. But
his heart felt hard as stone as he watched Marie's streaming tears. All
the brutality of his fierce ancestors had rushed to arms in his nature.
The fancy came to his mind that he would still be hard and cold if he
had to see her flogged. Then at the suggested picture, something in him
writhed and revolted. He was not so hard as he had thought. He had to
steel himself against her by thinking of what she had done to Mary.
"You deserve to die!" said Peter.
"I want to die," Marie answered pitifully. She stood supporting herself
with an arm that clung to the high straight back of a Florentine chair.
"If you will only not tell Angelo till I am dead, that's all I'll ask.
Please wait--a little while. I couldn't live and look him in the face if
he knew, so I would have to kill myself before you told. I'm too unhappy
to be afraid of dying--for my own sake. I've suffered such agonies of
fear, nothing could be worse. But there's a reason why it would be
wicked to die just now--of my own accord. There's a child coming--in a
few months. Afterward, I'll swear to you to kill myself, and then you
can tell Angelo everything. Won't you wait till then--only till the end
of the summer? Mary would say yes, if she were here.
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