A year ago she would have flung herself upon her knees, sobbing: "David, David!" But the time for weeping and calling him had long gone by. These deeper depths of anguish neither moaned nor cried out. They just silently turned her to stone.
Every vestige of colour had left her face, yet she did not know she was pale. She sat, looking straight before her, and—realising.
David was dying; and David did not want her.
David was dying in Central Africa; yet his last request was that she should stay in England, until she heard of his death.
Every now and then her lips moved. She was repeating, quietly: "The merely nominal bond which has bound us together." And then, with a ghastly face, and eyes which widened with anguish: "I have called you my 'wife,' I know; but it has just been a courtesy title. Hasn't it?"
Hasn't it! Oh, David, has it? Was it a courtesy title at the top of the gangway? Good-bye, my wife. Was it a courtesy title, when that deep possessive yearning voice rang in her ears for hours afterwards; teaching her at last what love, marriage, and wifehood might really have meant?
Was it a courtesy title when his first letter arrived, and the words my dear wife came round her in her shame, like strong protective arms?
All this time, had it meant even less to David than she had thought?
Often her punishment had seemed greater than she could bear. Often the branding-iron of vain regret had seared her quivering heart.
But this—this was indeed the cruel pincers of the Roman torture-chamber at her very breasts!