Darrow had no idea how long he had sat there when he heardAnna's hand on the door. The effort of rising, and ofcomposing his face to meet her, gave him a factitious senseof self-control. He said to himself: "I must decide onsomething----" and that lifted him a hair's breadth abovethe whirling waters.
She came in with a lighter step, and he instantly perceivedthat something unforeseen and reassuring had happened.
"She's been with me. She came and found me on the terrace.
We've had a long talk and she's explained everything. Ifeel as if I'd never known her before!"Her voice was so moved and tender that it checked his startof apprehension.
"She's explained----?""It's natural, isn't it, that she should have felt a littlesore at the kind of inspection she's been subjected to? Oh,not from you--I don't mean that! But Madame de Chantelle'sopposition--and her sending for Adelaide Painter! She toldme frankly she didn't care to owe her husband to AdelaidePainter...She thinks now that her annoyance at feelingherself so talked over and scrutinized may have shown itselfin her manner to Owen, and set him imagining the insanethings he did...I understand all she must have felt, and Iagree with her that it's best she should go away for awhile. She's made me," Anna summed up, "feel as if I'd beendreadfully thick-skinned and obtuse!""YOU?""Yes. As if I'd treated her like the bric-a-brac that usedto be sent down here 'on approval,' to see if it would lookwell with the other pieces." She added, with a sudden flushof enthusiasm: "I'm glad she's got it in her to make onefeel like that!"She seemed to wait for Darrow to agree with her, or to putsome other question, and he finally found voice to ask:
"Then you think it's not a final break?""I hope not--I've never hoped it more! I had a word withOwen, too, after I left her, and I think he understands thathe must let her go without insisting on any positivepromise. She's excited...he must let her calm down..."Again she waited, and Darrow said: "Surely you can make himsee that.""She'll help me to--she's to see him, of course, before shegoes. She starts immediately, by the way, with AdelaidePainter, who is motoring over to Francheuil to catch the oneo'clock express--and who, of course, knows nothing of allthis, and is simply to be told that Sophy has been sent forby the Farlows."Darrow mutely signed his comprehension, and she went on:
"Owen is particularly anxious that neither Adelaide nor hisgrandmother should have the least inkling of what'shappened. The need of shielding Sophy will help him tocontrol himself. He's coming to his senses, poor boy; he'sashamed of his wild talk already. He asked me to tell youso; no doubt he'll tell you so himself."Darrow made a movement of protest. "Oh, as to that--thething's not worth another word.""Or another thought, either?" She brightened. "Promise meyou won't even think of it--promise me you won't be hard onhim!"He was finding it easier to smile back at her. "Why shouldyou think it necessary to ask my indulgence for Owen?"She hesitated a moment, her eyes wandering from him. Thenthey came back with a smile. "Perhaps because I need it formyself.""For yourself?""I mean, because I understand better how one can tortureone's self over unrealities."As Darrow listened, the tension of his nerves began torelax. Her gaze, so grave and yet so sweet, was like a deeppool into which he could plunge and hide himself from thehard glare of his misery. As this ecstatic sense envelopedhim he found it more and more difficult to follow her wordsand to frame an answer; but what did anything matter, exceptthat her voice should go on, and the syllables fall likesoft touches on his tortured brain?
"Don't you know," she continued, "the bliss of waking from abad dream in one's own quiet room, and going slowly over allthe horror without being afraid of it any more? That's whatI'm doing now. And that's why I understand Owen..." Shebroke off, and he felt her touch on his arm. "BECAUSEI'D DREAMED THE HORROR TOO!"He understood her then, and stammered: "You?""Forgive me! And let me tell you!...It will help you tounderstand Owen...There WERE little things...littlesigns...once I had begun to watch for them: your reluctanceto speak about her...her reserve with you...a sort ofconstraint we'd never seen in her before..."She laughed up at him, and with her hands in his hecontrived to say: "NOW you understand why?""Oh, I understand; of course I understand; and I want you tolaugh at me--with me! Because there were other thingstoo...crazier things still...There was even--last night onthe terrace--her pink cloak...""Her pink cloak?" Now he honestly wondered, and as she sawit she blushed.
"You've forgotten about the cloak? The pink cloak that Owensaw you with at the play in Paris? Yes...yes...I was madenough for that!...It does me good to laugh about it now!
But you ought to know that I'm going to be a jealouswoman...a ridiculously jealous woman...you ought to bewarned of it in time..."He had dropped her hands, and she leaned close and liftedher arms to his neck with one of her rare gestures ofsurrender.
"I don't know why it is; but it makes me happier now to havebeen so foolish!"Her lips were parted in a noiseless laugh and the tremor ofher lashes made their shadow move on her cheek. He lookedat her through a mist of pain and saw all her offered beautyheld up like a cup to his lips; but as he stooped to it adarkness seemed to fall between them, her arms slipped fromhis shoulders and she drew away from him abruptly.
"But she WAS with you, then?" she exclaimed; and then,as he stared at her: "Oh, don't say no! Only go and look atyour eyes!"He stood speechless, and she pressed on: "Don't deny it--oh,don't deny it! What will be left for me to imagine if youdo? Don't you see how every single thing cries it out? Owensees it--he saw it again just now! When I told him she'drelented, and would see him, he said: 'Is that Darrow'sdoing too?'"Darrow took the onslaught in silence. He might have spoken,have summoned up the usual phrases of banter and denial; hewas not even certain that they might not, for the moment,have served their purpose if he could have uttered themwithout being seen. But he was as conscious of what hadha............