"But I'm not going home," said Woodville.
"Aren't you? Where are you going?"
"To the Beafsteak Club. I'm dining with Mervyn, and we're not going to dress. I'll take you home first, if you like."
"No," said Sylvia. "I shall drive you nearly as far as the Club, drop you, and then go home by myself." She spoke decidedly, and gave the direction to the cabman. She had calculated that it would be a longer drive.
"It's twice as far!" she said with childish triumph. He looked at her trusting, adoring eyes, her smiling, longing lips, and looked out of the window. She put her hand on his arm, and he moved away quickly, almost shaking her off. With a smile she sat as far from him as possible. They began talking of all kinds of things—Sylvia talked most and most gaily—then, gradually, they fell into silence.
It was the end of a warm April day; they passed quickly, in the jingling cab, through the stale London streets, breathing the spring air that paradoxically suggested country walks, tender vows, sentiment and romance.... Was she hurt at his coldness? On the contrary, it seemed to exhilarate her. So close, yet so absolutely separated—not in mind, but by his will only—by that extraordinary moral sense of his, that was, to her, in her innocence, a dark mystery. Sylvia never forgot that drive. She felt one of those unforgettable moments of exalted passion, like the attainment of some great height that one may never reach again. She worshipped him.
As they reached the end of their drive, the personal magnetism was almost too strong for her—she nearly took his hand again, but resisted. The cab stopped.
"I should like to drive you back, Sylvia," he said, as he got out, "but—it's better not."
"All right!—Good-bye! I suppose I shall see you to-morrow morning."
"I hate leaving you here," he said.