Rosamond answered in French. There were no waiters near at the moment to overhear her. If there had been, they all understood French perfectly. But to Rosamond, French had always given a feeling of security. Her story was brief and simple. She had married at eighteen. It had been a girl's infatuation, and it had lasted just two years. No, there had never been any actual break between them. He had to take up this post in China. They were too poor for him to refuse it. It brought him five hundred a year.
"Out of which," said Elton, "he sends you a measly hundred."
"He knows I have some means of my own. Oh no, we have never quarrelled. It is just that the thing died. I should be sorry for his death, as I should be for the death of any old companion—nothing more than that. He would regard my death in the same way. There is no longer any love between us. He sends me four rather formal letters every year, and I send him four replies, telling him about London theatres and so on. It's funny, isn't it? But, my God!" (It did not sound so strong in French.)
"I do not think," said Elton slowly, "that you were meant to spend your years without love."
"No? How do you know?"
Elton smiled. "Do you know the eyes of women who do without love and do not need it? They are the eyes of a business-like fish. Your eyes are not like that."
She leant a little forward over the small table. "Look into them," she said, "and tell me what you read there."
"Don't do that. Do you want to drive me mad?"
"Yes—sometimes."
"Well, I dare not tell you what I read in your eyes."