She heard him cross the room, heard the door close behind him. She leaped from her bed to lock it. As she was halfway across the room, the door opened. Mechanically she snatched from the sofa a dark kimona, drew it round her. "I forgot to turn out your light," he said. "Oh—it was the night-stand light, wasn't it?" Then she had the sense of impending disaster and— His whole expression, body as well as face, changed. His eyes seemed starting from his head. "You—you"—he stammered—"That night when I came home unexpectedly—" He flung out his arms, dropped heavily to the chair behind him. "It's true!" he gasped. "It's true!"
The kimona that had helped to remind him and to betray her had dropped from her listless shoulders to the floor. She seated herself on the edge of the bed, her hands clasped loosely in her lap. She looked calmly at him. She now felt as much her normal self as she had up to the moment when Lizzie brought her the news that he had gone to Nanny. She was glad the crisis had come. More—she was glad he knew the truth. "Now," she said to herself, with dizzy elation, "I'll either die or begin to live. 'Nothing is settled, till it's settled right.' My life will be settled right, at last."
He made several attempts to look at her, could not lift his eyes. As they sat there she seemed innocence and he guilt. "Nanny told me," he said, as if feeling round for a beginning. Then, after a long wait, "She said she couldn't die with it on her conscience. I thought her mind was wandering—but—somehow—I couldn't—" He broke off. Another long wait. He ended it with the question she had been expecting: "Where's—he?"
"Gone."
Another pause, longer. "I'm stunned—stunned." He stared at the floor, his head between his hands, his elbows on his knees. "So—he ran away."
"I sent him."
"I am glad. I might have—" He did not finish. "I'm stunned," he muttered.
She clasped her hands round one knee—a favorite attitude of hers—and waited. It was a time for her to be silent, to watch, to wait. A word, any word, from her might cause the explosion.
"Why did you send him away?" he asked. It was as if he were talking with a stranger about an indifferent matter.
"Because he has nothing to do with this. It's between you and me."