She turned on him.
“Remember,” she said, “I am completely independent of you—completely. You make your arrangements, I make mine.”
He pondered this.
“You mean we are strangers from this minute?” he asked.
She halted and flushed. He was putting her in a trap, forcing her hand. She turned round on him.
“Strangers,” she said, “we can never be. But if you want to make any movement apart from me, then I wish you to know you are perfectly free to do so. Do not consider me in the slightest.”
Even so slight an implication that she needed him and was depending on him still was sufficient to rouse his passion. As he sat a change came over his body, the hot, molten stream mounted involuntarily through his veins. He groaned inwardly, under its bondage, but he loved it. He looked at her with clear eyes, waiting for her.
She knew at once, and was shaken with cold revulsion. How could he look at her with those clear, warm, waiting eyes, waiting for her, even now? What had been said between them, was it not enough to put them worlds asunder, to freeze them forever apart! And yet he was all transfused and roused, waiting for her.
It confused her. Turning her head aside, she said:
“I shall always tell you, whenever I am going to make any change—”