But the flash gave way to a look of weary resolve.
"Then I must tell the truth--to others," she said.
It confounded him for a moment.

But although here was a new Dorothea, belying all experience, his instinct for handling men and women told him at once what had happened.

He had driven her too far.

He was even clever enough to foresee that winning her back to obedience would be a ticklish, almost desperate, business; and even sensitive enough to redden at his blunder.
"You do not agree with my view ?" he asked, tapping the table slowly.
"I disbelieve it.

I have no right to believe it, even if I had the power.