What he
wanted now was to put me in his place; he wanted to give me a chance to
make the marquis feel ME."
"Mercy on us!" cried the old waiting-woman, "how wicked we all are!"
"I don't know," said Newman; "some of us are wicked, certainly. I am
very angry, I am very sore, and I am very bitter, but I don't know that
I am wicked. I have been cruelly injured. They have hurt me, and I want
to hurt them. I don't deny that; on the contrary, I tell you plainly
that it is the use I want to make of your secret."
Mrs. Bread seemed to hold her breath. "You want to publish them--you
want to shame them?"
"I want to bring them down,--down, down, down! I want to turn the tables
upon them--I want to mortify them as they mortified me. They took me up
into a high place and made me stand there for all the world to see me,
and then they stole behind me and pushed me into this bottomless pit,
where I lie howling and gnashing my teeth! I made a fool of myself
before all their friends; but I shall make something worse of them."
This passionate sally, which Newman uttered with the greater fervor that
it was the first time he had had a chance to say all this aloud, kindled
two small sparks in Mrs. Bread's fixed eyes. "I suppose you have a right
to your anger, sir; but think of the dishonor you will draw down on
Madame de Cintre.
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