"Morris," she said. "I am ashamed of something I did last night. I don't make any excuse—but I'm very, very much ashamed.... It was the way that I spoke to you and Belinda, when I came down to the drawing-room—just before we went out to dinner...."
"Now, really, Sophy——" he began. He thought she was at some of her "highbrow" subtleties. "I assure you that neither of us...."
Sophy broke in hastily.
"Wait, Morris.... I haven't done. I'm ashamed because I pretended not to know—how things were between you two—and I did know."
As she said these words she flushed as deeply as Loring did in hearing them. But she kept right on—she forced her eyes to remain on his.
"I was in the next room ... yesterday. I ... I ... saw...."
"For God's sake! ... don't!" exclaimed Loring, jumping up. He was white now.
Sophy took away her eyes from that white face. For all her impersonality of mood, that white, aghast face of his hurt her cruelly. The shame on it hurt her. It made her feel desperately ashamed, too.
He went to the window and stood looking out, his back towards her. And in the very lines of his back there was shame. And this shame wrung her, struck to her inmost self. Oh, how humiliating it all was! ... for them both! How she felt as though they were groping towards each other through mire.
She caught at all her force of will.