Betty read the small, sharp, careful writing, very familiar to her.
I have instructed your maid to pack your things and to return at
once to your husband's house. He is a much too merciful man. You
have treated him shamelessly. I can find no excuse for you. My
house is definitely closed to you. I will send you no money,
allow you no support, countenance you in no way. This is final.
You have only one course, to return humbly and with penitence to
your husband, submit yourself to him, and learn to love and
honor and obey him as he deserves. The evidence of your guilt is
incontrovertible. I utterly disbelieve your story against him.
It is part of your sin, and it is easily to be explained in the
light of my present knowledge of your real character. Whether
you return to Morena or not, I emphatically reassert that I will
not see you or speak to you again. You are to my mind a woman of
shameless life, such a woman as I should feel justified in
turning out of any decent household.
Woodward Kane The room turned giddily about Betty. She saw the whole roaring city
turn about her, and she knew that there was no home in it for her. She
could go to Prosper Gael, but at what horrible sacrifice of pride,
and, if Jasper now refused to bring suit, could she ask this man, who
no longer loved her, to keep her as his mistress? What could she do?
Where could she turn? How could she keep herself alive? For the first
time, life, stripped of everything but its hard and ugly bones, faced
her. She had always been sheltered, been dependent, been loved. Once
before she had lost courage and had failed to venture beyond the
familiar shelter of custom and convention. Now, she was again most
horribly afraid. Anything was better than this feeling of being lost,
alone. She looked at Jasper. At that moment he was nothing but a
protector, a means of life, and he knew it.
"Will you come home with me now?" he asked her bitterly.
Betty forced the twisted mouth to speech. "What else is there for me
to do?" she said.