The Salamanca Corpus: Yeoman Fleetwood (1900 ... - Gredos

The Salamanca Corpus: Yeoman Fleetwood (1900)
repeated with frenzied impatience; "if you delay any longer, I vow I will refuse your
escort altogether."
Humphrey, much chagrined, withdrew, and when the door closed behind him Rachel
turned to Simon.
"I will not delay you long," she said quickly, "but I have something here which I must
return to you."
She tore off her glove as she spoke, and began to pluck fiercely at the ill-fitting but
firmly secured wedding-ring.
"My God!" broke out Simon, "I am punished— I might have known there could have
been no blessing."
The cry burst from him almost without his knowledge, but Rachel heard, and it fanned
the flame of her resentment.
"What, you would twit me now, I suppose? You would reproach me for my blind folly
— my — my imbecile confidence. Oh, it is of a piece with the rest"
While she spoke she was still dragging at the ring, but the little silken thread, tightly
knotted by Simon's fingers, held fast; with a yet more desperate wrench she at length
succeeded in freeing herself, but not before the tightly-drawn thread had cut into the soft
flesh, causing blood to flow.
"Oh, your hand,” cried Simon impulsively, "your poor little hand!"
The involuntarily tender tone, so often welcomed, but now so abhorrent, caused her
heart to swell nigh to bursting. She turned upon him like a little tigress.
"What is my hand to you? I would strike it off could I rid myself at the same time of its
shame in having worn your pledge.”
[291]
She held out the ring now, the blood dripping from her lacerated finger.
"Take it back, take it! Would that I could cast away with it the memory of this
degrading farce of a marriage! Oh, I know that it was my doing. I put myself in your
power, I unsexed myself— all through it is I who have taken the lead, thinking, poor
dolt that I was! that your over-nice sense of honour, your excessive delicacy of feeling,
held you back. It was I, I who urged, while you, forsooth, made pretence of hesitation.