“You wish to be free?” I asked, and my tone must have been gentle.
“I wish to free you,” she replied slowly and deliberately.
There was a long silence. Then I said: “I must think it all out. I once told you how I felt about these matters. I've greatly changed my mind since our talk that night in the Willoughby; but my prejudices are still with me. Perhaps you will not be surprised at that—you whose prejudices have cost me so dear.”
I thought she was going to speak. Instead she turned away, so that I could no longer see her face.
“Our marriage was a miserable mistake,” I went on, struggling to be just and judicial, and to seem calm. “I admit it now. Fortunately, we are both still young—you very young. Mistakes in youth are never fatal. But, Anita, do not blunder out of one mistake into another. You are no longer a child, as you were when I married you. You will be careful not to let judgments formed of him long ago decide you for him as they decided you against me.”
“I wish to be free,” she said, each word coming with an effort, “as much on your account as on my own.” Then, and it seemed to me merely a truly feminine attempt to shirk responsibility, she added, “I am glad my going will be a relief to you.”
“Yes, it will be a relief,” I confessed. “Our situation has become intolerable.” I had reached my limit of self-control. I put out my hand. “Good-by,” I said.
If she had wept, it might have modified my conviction that everything was at an end between us. But she did not weep. “Can you ever forgive me?” she asked.
“Let's not talk of forgiveness,” said I, and I fear my voice and manner were gruff, as I strove not to break down. “Let's try to forget.” And I touched her hand and hastened away.
When two human beings set out to misunderstand each other, how fast and far they go! How shut-in we are from each other, with only halting means of communication that break down under the slightest strain!