CHAPTER XXIII 

"On the eve of one's wedding day too." 

He could not see Elsa till she was quite close to him, and even then he could only vaguely distinguish the quaint contour of her wide-sleeved shift and of her voluminous petticoats. 

But his cigar had gone out, and when Elsa stood quite close to him, and softly murmured his name, he struck a match very deliberately, and held it to the cigar so that it lighted up his face for a few seconds. He wanted her to see how indifferent was the expression in his eye, and that there was not the slightest trace of a welcoming smile lurking round his lips. 

Therefore he held the lighted match close to his face much longer than was necessary; he only dropped it when it began to scorch his fingers. Then he blew a big cloud of smoke out of his cigar straight into her face, and only after that did he say, speaking very roughly: 

"What do you want?" 

"Mother sent me, Béla," she said timidly, as she placed a trembling little hand on his coat-sleeve. "I wouldn't have come, only she ordered me, and I couldn't disobey her, so I . . ." 

"Couldn't disobey your mother, eh?" he sneered; "you couldn't defy her as you did me, what?" 

"I didn't mean to defy you, Béla," she said, striving with all her might to keep back the rebellious words which surged out of her overburdened heart to her quivering lips. "I couldn't be unkind to Jenö and Károly, and all my old friends, just this last evening, when I am still a girl amongst them." 
What does Béla say Elsa has done to him?
"you couldn't defy her as you did me, what?