"Because I ask you to."
"But why should you ask me to, when I'm only stating facts? It is a fact, isn't it? that our marriage was a true one in every sense in which a marriage can be true, till other people—no, let me go on!—till other people—your Aunt Emily most of all—advised you to exact your pound of flesh and the strict rigor of the law. I gave you your pound of flesh, Edith, right off the heart; so that if atonement could be made in that way—"
"Chip, will you tell me what good there is in bringing this up now? You're married to some one else, and so am I. We can't go back, because we've burned the bridges behind us—"
"But it's something to know that we'd go back if we could."
"I haven't said so."
"True."
He fell silent because of the impossibility of speech. He made no move to go. To sit with her in this way, without speaking, was like an obliteration of the last seven years, reducing them to a nightmare. It was a shock to him, therefore, when she pointed to a distant spire on a hill, saying:
"There's Harrow. We shall be in London in half an hour."
In London in half an hour, and this brief renewal of what never should have been interrupted would be ended! He recalled similar journeys with her over this very bit of line, when the arrival in London had been but the beginning of long delightful days together. And now he might not see her for another seven years; he might never see her any more. It was unnatural, incredible, impossible; and yet the facts precluded any rebellion on his part against them. Even if she were willing to rebel he couldn't do it—with a wife and boy in New York. He had married again on purpose to satisfy his longing for a child—a family. He felt very tenderly toward them, the little chap and his mother; but he was clear as to the fact that he felt tenderly toward them, pityingly tender, largely because when face to face with Edith he wished to God that they had never been part of his life. And doubtless she felt the same toward her Mr. Lacon and the child of that union. But she would never admit it—not directly, at any rate. He might gather it from hints, or read it between the lines; but he could never make her say so. Why should she say so? What good would it do? Were she to confess to him that she hated the man toward whom she was traveling, he would experience an unholy satisfaction—but, after all, it would be unholy.
In the end he could find no simpler relief to his feelings than to take down her belongings from the overhead racks.