But I must ask you--because I have so much at stake!--was I alone to blame ?--Was there not some excuse ?--had you no part in it ?" He stood over her, a splendid accusing figure, and the excited girl beside him was bewildered by the adroitness with which he had carried the war into her own country.
"How mean!--how ungenerous!" Her agitation would hardly let her speak coherently.

"When we were riding, you ordered me--yes, it was practically that!--you warned me, in a manner that nobody--_nobody_ -- has any right to use with me--unless he were my fiance or my husband--that I was not to dance with Otto Radowitz--I was not to see so much of Mr.Sorell.So just to show you that I was really not at your beck and call--that you could not do exactly what you liked with me--I danced with Mr.Radowitz last night, and I refused to dance with you.
Oh, yes, I know I was foolish--I daresay I was in a temper too--but how you can make that any excuse for your attack on that poor boy--how you can make me responsible, if--" Her voice failed her.

But Falloden saw that he had won some advantage, and he pushed on.
"I only want to point out that a man is not exactly a stock or a stone to be played with as you played with me last night.

Those things are dangerous! Can you deny--that you have given me some reason to hope--since we met again--to hope confidently, that you might change your mind?
Would you have let me arrange those rides for you--unknown to your friends--would you have met me in the woods, those heavenly times--would you have danced with me as you did--would you have let me pay you in public every sort of attention that a man can pay to a girl, when he wants to marry her, the night of the Marmion ball--if you had not felt something for me--if you had not meant to give me a little hope--to keep the thing at least uncertain?
No!--if this business does turn out badly, I shall have remorse enough, God knows--but you can't escape! If you punish me for it, if I alone am to pay the penalty, it will be not only Radowitz that has a grievance--not only Radowitz whose life will have been spoilt!" She turned to him--hypnotised, subdued, by the note of fierce accusation--by that self-pity of the egotist--which looked out upon her from the young man's pale face and tense bearing.
"No"-- she said trembling--"no--it is quite true--I have treated you badly.

I have behaved wilfully and foolishly.