A Heart's Bitterness — page 77: what you’re looking at

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A HEART'S BITTERNESS. | | 6B re we two will go down to death together, and if I cannot have love, I will haye vengeance.” He shuddered at her tone; it had a weight as of prophecy init. She towered in her fury as a sibyl. “ ‘‘Helen Hope, what have I done more than other men that I should be pursued in this fashion?” “You thought you exercised your patrician right when you trifled with me, a poor, lonely girl. I believed all that | you said. I grew to adore you because I thought you stooped from high estate to lift me to your rank. And what were ‘you doing all the time? Merely courting me, that through me you might gain access to my pupil; merely making me a means of reaching Edna. When my whole soul was at your feet; when I loved the sound of your voice, envied the _ air that blew about you, the very servants who waited on you—when you were my one thought in life, I found you at her feet protesting your passion for her, and when she told you she supposed you cared for me, you laughed the idea to scorn, and said you never had had such a thought ---that she Was mistaken---that you had merely been a little kind to a forlorn soul. Jam a forlorn soul; you have made me doubly so. Norman Leigh, I stand between love and hate. I swear to you you shall once more be free to choose a wife, and you shall choose me or die!” ““You are mad,” said Leigh, with a thrill of fear. ‘Hear me,” she said. ‘‘I am resolved to be Countess of Leigh. You shall be free, and you shall be glad to marry me. ‘The fortune you needed to restore your estates is yours. I will beno wife to be ashamed of; I know how to hold my own; there is good blood in my veins. I will not be hindered of the one hope of my life. Mark my words ---you shall marry me, or die with me!” ‘This talk is all idle,” said Leigh. ‘‘ Go your way, and I will go mine.” Mark me, I will not meet you again. Any- thing in reason to satisfy you I will do, but I will not come to hear threats and protestations.” He returned hastily to the splendors of the ball-room, and left Helen Hope gazing into the black depths of the river, | Q Eomicbooks.co