The New Magdalen

"Take care!" said Mercy. "Take care!"

"Mr. Julian Gray! I was behind the billiard-room door--I saw you coax

Mr. Julian Gray to come in! confession loses all its horrors, and

becomes quite a luxury, with Mr. Julian Gray!"

"No more, Miss Roseberry! no more! For God's sake, don't put me beside

myself! You have tortured me enough already."

"You haven't been on the streets for nothing. You are a woman with

resources; you know the value of having two strings to your bow. If Mr.

Holmcroft fails you, you have got Mr. Julian Gray. Ah! you sicken me.

_I'll_ see that Mr. Holmcroft's eyes are opened; he shall know what a

woman he might have married but for Me--"

She checked herself; the next refinement of insult remained suspended on

her lips.

The woman whom she had outraged suddenly advanced on her. Her eyes,

staring helplessly upward, saw Mercy Merrick's face, white with the

terrible anger which drives the blood back on the heart, bending

threateningly over her.

"'You will see that Mr. Holmcroft's eyes are opened,'" Mercy slowly

repeated; "'he shall know what a woman he might have married but for

you!'"

She paused, and followed those words by a question which struck a

creeping terror through Grace Roseberry, from the hair of her head to

the soles of her feet: "_Who are you?_"

The suppressed fury of look and tone which accompanied that question

told, as no violence could have told it, that the limits of Mercy's

endurance had been found at last. In the guardian angel's absence the

evil genius had done its evil work. The better nature which Julian

Gray had brought to life sank, poisoned by the vile venom of a womanly

spiteful tongue. An easy and a terrible means of avenging the outrages

heaped on her was within Mercy's reach, if she chose to take it. In the

frenzy of her indignation she never hesitated--she took it.

"Who are you?" she asked for the second time.

Grace roused herself and attempted to speak. Mercy stopped her with a

scornful gesture of her hand.

"I remember!" she went on, with the same fiercely suppressed rage. "You

are the madwoman from the German hospital who came here a week ago. I am

not afraid of you this time. Sit down and rest yourself, Mercy Merrick."

Deliberately giving her that name to her face, Mercy turned from her

and took the chair which Grace had forbidden her to occupy when the

interview began. Grace started to her feet.

"What does this mean?" she asked.

"It means," answered Mercy, contemptuously, "that I recall every word

I said to you just now. It means that I am resolved to keep my place in

this house."

"Are you out of your senses?"

"You are not far from the bell. Ring it. Do what you asked _me_ to do.

Call in the whole household, and ask them which of us is mad--you or I."