"No—let's go to him together." Basil's face lighted up, his manner became enthusiastic. He thought he saw a way to redeem his manhood put in pawn for this sin so dear yet so detestable. "Together!" he exclaimed. "He is generous and broadminded."
She shook her head. "Men are not generous and broadminded where women are concerned—the women they look on as theirs."
He colored and glanced guiltily at her. But it was plain that she had not in mind his own exhibition of the male attitude toward the female. His memory of it helped him to appreciate the folly of his proposal. But he would not give in at once. "I'd not suggest it, if he really loved you. But——"
"If he really loved me, he'd have felt the truth long ago. If he really loved me, he'd wish me to be happy—would give me up. But then—if he had really loved me, none of this would ever have happened. No, Basil, it's because he doesn't love me, because it's only passion that takes and gives nothing, that uses and doesn't think or care about the feelings of its creature——"
Basil, horror-stricken by this bald candor, ashamed for her, stopped her. "Let's not talk about it," he pleaded. "As for the divorce, I leave it to you. You know best how to deal with him."
His manner and its cause had not escaped her, with nerves keyed up to the snapping point. Once again he had raised in her heart the dread lest their love would not mean the perfect frankness, the perfect oneness of which she had dreamed. Did a man always demand and compel concealment and pretense in the woman? But she thrust out the doubt. "I'll do what seems best," she said to him, avoiding his eyes and speaking with constraint. "I don't know Richard very well. You see, we never got acquainted. He's like most men. They don't want the woman, but only the outside.... He's so wrapped up in his work that I think I can free myself."
He took her hands, gazed into her eyes. "Yes," he said, "you do love me. You feel that we belong to each other, just as I do. So when I'm away I'll know you are coming—as soon as you can."
"As soon as I can," she replied. And the expression of her eyes, meeting his steadfastly, and the deep notes in her sweet voice thrilled him with a new sense of her love and of her constancy. This woman had not given in whim; she would not change in whim.
"I will go—to-morrow," he said. "The sooner I go, the sooner I shall have you. Will you come to-night to say good-by?"
"Don't ask it, dear. I mustn't ever again—until I'm free."