I but asked her to come.

In sheer truth, I wished but to see her." "And by what right could you expect that ?" "I asked her as my affianced wife," replied John Law.
Mary Connynge stood an inch taller, as she sprang to her feet in sudden scorn and bitterness.
"Your affianced wife!" cried she.

"What! So soon! Oh, rare indeed must be my opinion of this Lady Catharine!" "It was never my way to waste time on a journey," said John Law, coolly.
"Your wife, your affianced wife ?" "As I said." "Yes," cried Mary Connynge, bitterly, and again, unconsciously and in sheer anger, falling upon that course which best served her purpose.
"And what manner of affianced wife is it would forsake her lover at the first breath of trouble?
My God! 'tis then, it seems to me, a woman would most swiftly fly to the man she loved." John Law turned slowly toward her, his eyes scanning her closely from top to toe, noting the heaving of her bosom, the sparkling of her gold-colored eye, now darkened and half ready to dissolve in tears.

He stood as though he were a judge, weighing the evidence before him, calmly, dispassionately.
"Would you do so much as that, Mary Connynge ?" asked John Law.
"I, sir ?" she replied.

"Then why am I here to-night myself?
But, God pity me, what have I said?
There is nothing but misfortune in all my life!" It was one rebellious, unsubdued nature speaking to another, and of the two each was now having its own sharp suffering.