‘I know nothing of the sort,’ he said. ‘We belong to each other. That’s all I know. I have you now: you needn’t think I shall let you go. You will leave that damned place this evening with me. That’s the only reason why we mustn’t be long here.’
She raised her eyes to his, and without speaking shook her head.
‘But it is to be so,’ he cried. ‘There’s no other way out. We’ve found each other: do you think I am going to let us lose each other? There is no other way.’
Even as he spoke, that silent inexorable tug, that irresistible tide of character which sweeps up against all counter-streams of impulse which do not flow with it, began to move within him. He meant all he said, and yet he knew that it was not to be. And as he looked at her, he saw in her eyes that fathomless eternal pity, which is as much a part of love as is desire.
‘There is no way out there,’ she said. ‘Look into yourself and tell me if you really believe there is. The way is barred. You yourself bar it. How could I then pass over it?’
‘If you loved me——’ he began.
‘Ah, hush; don’t say that. It is nonsense, wicked nonsense. Isn’t it?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
She was infinitely stronger than he: a dozen times in details she had proved that. Now, when there was no detail, but a vital issue at stake, she could show all her strength, instead of but sparring with him.
‘Well, then, listen,’ she said. ‘We are honest folk, my dear, both you and I. You are under certain obligations; you have a wife and children. And since I love you, I am under the same obligations. They are yours, and therefore they are mine. If it weren’t for them—but it is no use thinking of that.’