She stepped close, laying her hand on his arm.
“Do you know, I begin to see what marriage is for. It’s to keep people away from each other. Sometimes I think that two people who love each other can be saved from madness only by the things that come between them—children, duties, visits, bores, relations—the things that protect married people from each other. We’ve been too close together—that has been our sin. We’ve seen the nakedness of each other’s souls.”
She sank again on the sofa, hiding her face in her hands.
Gannett stood above her perplexedly: he felt as though she were being swept away by some implacable current while he stood helpless on its bank.
At length he said, “Lydia, don’t think me a brute—but don’t you see yourself that it won’t do?”
“Yes, I see it won’t do,” she said without raising her head.
His face cleared.
“Then we’ll go to-morrow.”
“Go—where?”
“To Paris; to be married.”