"Do?" echoed Jean blankly. "Why, I'm going away."
"You're going away! You're going to give him up, without any more fight than this! You're going to swallow every single thing I've said, without asking him? I say, how do you know it's the truth? How do you know it's not all a lie, except my loving him?"
"I don't know," but as she spoke Jean felt something drop from her eyes. With no warning this thing had come upon her and there was no doubt in her. Like the sucking blackness at the bottom of the well, it had always been there.
The Kitten smiled. "He must have had a hell of a time with you. Poor Boy Blue."
Mechanically Jean put on her things, the things she had thrown down when she came in and found Herrick just leaving. It was queer to put them on again, the things that had not changed at all, while she had been on such a long journey and come back. The Kitten was watching, fascinated into silence by the ordinary movements of Jean pinning on her hat, gathering up her gloves and handbag. When she was quite ready, Jean turned to The Kitten. She felt no anger or disgust now. Instead, she was sorry for the little thing, so eager, so avid, so unsure.
"You can tell him," she said slowly, "that I shall be at the Hill House. I don't want him to come. Please tell him that. But if there's anything to be discussed, he can write. I don't see what it can be, but I suppose he will want to."
"Oh, yes, he'll write."
Then, for no reason at all, the two women smiled faintly, as if they were speaking of a child. And, always afterward, Jean remembered The Kitten as she looked smiling above the greasy dishes.