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Johnson, Owen, 1878-1952

"Murder in Any Degree"

I'll keep it! Thanks!"
With a gradual motion, she loosened her filmy cloak and let it slip from
the suddenly revealed shoulders and slender body.
"No, no, I forbid you!" he cried. Anger--animal, instinctive
anger--began to possess him. He became brutal as he felt himself growing
weak.
"Either you go out or I do!"
"You will listen."
"What? To lies?"
"When you have heard me, you will understand, Jack."
"There is nothing to be said. I have not the slightest intention of
taking back--"
"Jack!"
Her voice rang out with sudden impressiveness: "I swear to you I have
not met him, I swear to you I came back of my own free will, because I
could not meet him, because I found that it was you--you only--whom I
wanted!"
"That is a lie!"
She recoiled before the wound in his glance. She put her long white hand
over her heart, throwing all of herself into the glance that sought to
conquer him.
"I swear it," she said simply.
"Another lie!"
"Jack!"
It was a physical rage that held him now, a rage divided against
itself--that longed to strike down, to crush, to stifle the thing it
coveted.


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