I shrugged my shoulders and said nothing; but the silence and the gesture were more expressive than many words.
My visitor tore off the veil she had worn till now, and throwing herself into a chair looked at me as though trying to read my innermost thoughts: while I was trying to read hers and was more than half suspicious that she might see enough to let her jump at the truth.
But a rapid reflection shewed me I should be wise to use the means she herself had supplied, as an excuse for the change in me toward her. It was dangerous, of course, to set at defiance a woman of her manifest force of character and in her position; but in attempting to continue even an innocent intrigue with her there was equal danger.
She remained silent a long time, considering as it seemed to me, how she should prevent my breaking away from her. She was a clever woman, and now that the first outburst of emotion was over, she abandoned all hysterical display and resolved, as her words soon proved, to appeal to my fears rather than to any old love.
She laughed very softly and musically when she spoke next.
"So you think you can do as you will with me, Alexis?"
"On the contrary," I replied, quite as gently and with an answering smile. "I have no wish to have anything at all to do with you."
"Yet you loved me once," she murmured, the involuntary closing of her eyelids being the only sign of the pain my brutal words caused.
"The sweetest things in life are the memories of the past, Paula. If you really loved me as you said, it will be something for you to remember that while you prized my life, you held my love."
"A man would starve on the memory of yesterday's dinner."