"Why do you speak of Elizabeth now," he said, "after all these months of silence?"
She shook her head.
"I don't know. Why does one do anything? It occurred to me, I suppose, to speak of Elizabeth because she is here, and because I was going across to see her. She never loved you, Edward."
"No. You told me that."
He spoke quietly and reassuringly, but it occurred to him that for some reason Edith was beginning to doubt that, for she looked at him, so it seemed, with a certain question and challenge in her eye. It was as if she weighed his answer, or took it, like a doubtful coin, and rang it to test its genuineness.
"I shall go now," she said, still lingering. "Or do you not wish me to go?"
She paused a moment.
"Why do you not wish me to go, Edward?" she said.
"I want you to do just as you wish, dear," he said.
For the moment a certain cloud of trouble and restlessness, quite alien to her normal reasoning, had seemed to disturb her. But it cleared, and she spoke naturally again.