Part 39 (1/2)
He had risen also, and we stood face to face.
”Do you suppose,” he asked doggedly, ”now I am free I'd consent to marry any woman but you? I'll make you marry me yet, Ruth Privet, for I know perfectly well you love me. Think how long we were engaged.”
I remembered the question he asked me when he came back from Franklin after he had seen her: ”How long have we been engaged?”
”I shall keep your wife,” was all I said, ”until she is well and chooses to go. George, I beg of you not to let her baby be born fatherless.”
A hateful look came into his eyes.
”I thought you were fond of fatherless babies,” he sneered.
”Go,” I said, hardly controlling myself, ”and don't come here again without Mr. Saychase.”
”If I bring him it will be to marry you, Ruth.”
Something in me rose up and spoke without my volition. I did not know what I was saying until the words were half said. I crossed the room and rang the bell for Rosa, and as I did it I said:--
”I see I must have a husband to protect me from your insults, and I will marry Tom Webbe.”
Before he could answer, Rosa appeared.
”Rosa,” I said, and all my calmness had come back, ”will you show Mr.
Weston to the door. I am not at home to him again until he comes with Mr. Saychase.”
She restrained her surprise and amus.e.m.e.nt better than I expected, but before she had had time to do more than toss her head George had rushed away without ceremony. By this time, I suppose, every man, woman, and child in town knows that I have turned him out of my house.
November 7. ”And after the fire a still, small voice!” I have been saying this over and over to myself; and remembering, not irreverently, that G.o.d was in the voice.
I have had a talk with Tom which has moved me more than all the trouble with George. The very fact that George so outraged all my feelings and made me so angry kept me from being touched as I might have been otherwise; but this explanation with Tom has left me shaken and tired out. It is emotion and not physical work that wears humanity to shreds.
Tom came to discuss the reading-room. He is delighted that it has started so well and is going on so swimmingly; and he is full of plans for increasing the interest. I was, I confess, so preoccupied with what I had made up my mind to say to him I could hardly follow what he was saying. I felt as if something were grasping me by the throat. He looked at me strangely, but he went on talking as if he did not notice my uneasiness.
”Tom,” I broke out at last, when I could endure it no longer, ”did you know that Mrs. Weston is here, very ill?”
”Yes,” was all he answered.
”And, Tom,” I hurried on, ”George won't remarry her.”
”Won't remarry her?” he echoed. ”The cur!”
”He was here yesterday,” I went on desperately, ”and he said he is determined to marry me.”
Tom started forward with hot face and clenched fist.
”The blackguard! I wish I'd been here to kick him out of the house! What did you say to him?”
”I told him he had insulted me, and forbade him to come here again without Mr. Saychase to remarry them,” I said. Then before Tom's searching look I became so confused he could not help seeing there was more.
”Well?” he demanded.