Now, the act of pinning on a button-hole under some circumstances is bound to lead to a good deal, therefore in this case, that an arm should close around the operatrix seems hardly surprising.
“Do you still venerate that vacant old fetish? It parted us once, Vivien.”
Again she is silent, and her eyes fill. The great black and orange stripes of the tiger skins seem to dance in angry rays before her vision. Her voice will not come to her. But he continues:
“Has it never occurred to you that you—that we—made a very considerable mistake that time? We each found our counterpart in the other. Surely such an experience is unique. Then what happened? You set up a fetish—a miserable fraud—a mere whimsical conception of an idol—and called it Duty—while I—I was fool enough to let you do it.”
“I don’t know why things were ordered that way,” he continues, for still Vivien makes no reply—“or for what purpose, of earth or heaven, five years of happiness should have been knocked off our lives. But for whatever it is, I don’t believe for a moment it was arranged we should meet so strangely and unexpectedly in this out of the way part of the world—all for nothing. We have been brought together again, and we have tried to keep up the rôle of strangers—of mere acquaintances—and the whole thing is a most wretched and flimsy fiasco. Is it not?”
“Yes.”
She is looking at him now, full and earnestly. Her fingers are toying with the “button-hole” she has pinned on his coat. Unconsciously she is leaning on him as he holds her within his embrace.
“Our love showed forth in every moment, in every word, in every action of our lives,” he continues. “The mask we tried to wear was quite unavailable to stifle the cry of two aching hearts. Listen, darling. There is no room for affectation between us now. Our love is as ever it was—rather is it stronger. Am I right?”
“Yes. You are the one love of my life, and always have been. And you know it—dearest.”
So sweet, so soft comes this reply, that the very tones are as an all pervading caress.