“No, you are right. Do you expect me to come towards you on that road?”
“On what road?” asked Tom, wonderingly.
Then quite suddenly and for the first time the real reason for his wife’s attitude struck him. He got up and stood before her, and at that moment she was desperately afraid of him. The anger which had possessed her seemed to have transferred itself to him.
“May, how dare you think that?” he asked. “Are you not ashamed of yourself?”
The least tremor passed through her, and she stood there not daring to meet his eyes. The next moment he had turned from her and was walking towards the door. Once she tried to find her voice and failed, but before he had left the room she managed to speak.
“Tom, wait a minute,” she said.
He turned at once. He had been longing with all his soul that she should say just that one word. He had been horribly wounded by her. Yet he felt that he had never cared for her before as he cared now. He crossed the room, sat down where he had sat before, and waited. The next moment she had flung herself on her knees by him, and her face was buried on his shoulder.
“My poor darling! what is it?” whispered Tom. “No, dear, don’t tell me yet; wait a moment—yes, wait so. Come closer to me, May, closer. Your place is here.”
In a few minutes her wild sobbing had become less passionate, and she raised her face to his.
“I want to tell you,” she said. “I could never look you in the face again unless I told you. You know, but I must tell you. I thought—oh, Tom, Tom, what a brute I have been—I thought you cared for her, that she amused you, when I didn’t. I can’t amuse you, I know. I’m not amusing by nature, dear. And—and I thought your being willing to accept money from her, when you wouldn’t let me sell out mine and give it you, meant just that. I wish you would take it, Tom. Tom, I can’t tell you how I want to do something for you. Or take hers—that would be better. It will show that I know what a brute I have been, if I ask you to. Please do, Tom. But say you forgive me first. Oh, I have spoiled it all—it can never be the same again!”