She shrugged her shoulders a little. She seemed composed and almost careless as she answered, with a touch of contempt:
"No; but it is true, for all that."
CHAPTER XVI
THE UPPER AND THE NETHER STONE
"Then you must come back with me," said Grantley. Young Blake sprang forward a step, crying—"By God, no!"
Neither of them heeded him; their eyes were on one another. Already the fight was between the two, and the two only.
"Do you really think that?" she asked. "I don't know how you come to be here—I suppose Christine warned you somehow; but it's by mere accident that you are here, and that I haven't gone before now. It makes no difference. You're not in time, as you call it. The thing is settled already; it was settled when I planned to come, not when I came. What you meant doesn't count. Do you really think I shall come back now?"
"Yes, you must come back now."
"Back to that life? Never! Of course you don't know what it was to me, and I don't suppose I could tell you. You wouldn't understand."
Blake threw himself into a chair by the window. He was helplessly impatient of the situation. Grantley came a little nearer the table and stood there, to all seeming impassive. The appearance was not very deceptive. He was not now dominated by emotion; he was possessed by a resolve. His love for his wife was far buried in his heart; his set purpose was all he knew.
"I don't see what you had to complain of," he said coldly. "The way we lived was your choice, not mine. But I'm not going to discuss that. I'm here to take you home to your husband's house and to your child."