12
Voices were sounding in the next room. Something being argued. A voice level and reassuring; going up now and again into a hateful amused falsetto. Miriam refused to listen. She had never been so near before. Of course they talked in their room. They had talked all their lives; an endless conversation; he laying down the law ... no end to it ... the movement of his beard as he spoke, the red lips shining through the fair moustache ... splash baths and no soap; soap is not a cleansing agent ... he had a ruddy skin ... healthy.
A tearful, uncertain voice....
“Don’t mother ... don’t, don’t ... he can’t understand.... Come to me! Come in here.... Well, well!...” A loud clear tone moving near the door, “Leave it all to nature, my dear....”
They’re talking about Sally and Harriett.... He is amused ... like when he says “the marriage service begins with ‘dearly beloved’ and ends with ‘amazement.’ ...”
She turned about, straining away from the wall and burying her head in her pillow. Something seemed to shriek within her, throwing him off, destroying, flinging him away. Never again anything but contempt....
She lay weak and shivering in the uncomfortable little bed. Her heart was thudding in her throat and in her hands ... beloved ... beloved ... a voice, singing—
“So ear-ly in the mor-ning,
My beloved—my beloved.”
Silence, darkness and silence.