"I knew it! I knew it! I knew it would come!" She turned to a tall chest of drawers as high as her breasts, laden with silverware, jewel-boxes, brushes and combs, and, putting her arms down, she laid her head upon them and began to cry.

This was the last straw.

He was throwing up her lawless girlhood love to her as an offense.
"Oh!" she sobbed, and shook in a hopeless, wretched paroxysm.
Cowperwood came over quickly.

He was distressed, pained.

"I didn't mean that, Aileen," he explained.