those of a serpent. And at intervals, as she moved about the room, she
clenched her hands with such energy that the nails wounded her palms. And
from time to time her rage would rise to a kind of frenzy, and find
expression in a voice strangely harsh and unnatural, deeper than a man's,
and then suddenly rising to a shrill piercing key that startled Fan and
made her tremble. Poor Fan! that little burst of transitory anger she had
experienced in the Gardens seemed now only a pitifully weak exhibition
compared with the black tempest raging in this strong, undisciplined
woman's soul.

"And I have loved him--loved that hell-hound! God! shall I ever cease to
despise and loathe myself for sinking into such a depth of infamy! Never
--never--until his viper head has been crushed under my heel! To strike!
to crush! to torture! How?--have I no mind to think? Nothing can I do--
nothing--nothing! Are there no means? Ah, how sweet to scorch the skin
and make the handsome face loathsome to look at! To burn the eyes up in
their sockets--to shut up the soul for ever in thick blackness!... Oh, is
there no wise theologian who can prove to me that there is a hell, that
he will be chained there and tortured everlastingly! That would satisfy
me--to remember it would be sweeter than Heaven."

Suddenly she turned in a kind of fury on Fan, who had risen trembling
from her seat. "Sit down!" she said. "Hide your miserable white face from
my sight! You could have warned me in time, you could have saved me from
this, and you failed to do it! Oh, I could strike you dead with my hand
for your imbecile cowardice!... And he will escape me! To blast his name,
to hold him up to public scorn and hatred, years of imprisonment in a
felon's cell--all, all the suffering we can inflict on such a fiendish
wretch seems weak and childish, and could give no comfort to my soul. Oh,
it drives me mad to think of it--I shall go mad--I shall go mad!" And