She spoke fiercely, with a gleam in her eyes that Vera had never seen before. She drew back, frightened and alarmed. It seemed incredible that gentle Marion could repulse her like this. But she did not go.
Marion was beside herself with grief; she did not know what she was saying. It was impossible to leave her in this condition.
"You are grieving for Geoffrey," she said. "He will come back to us."
"Geoffrey is dead," Marion wailed. "He will never come back. And I——"
She paused; she had not lost control of herself entirely. But the look in her eyes, the expression of her face, the significant pause told Vera a story. It burst upon her with the full force of a sudden illumination.
"Marion," she whispered, "you love him as well as I do——"
So her secret was known at last! And Marion was only a woman, after all. The selfishness of her grief drove away all other emotions.
"As you do?" she cried. "What do you with your gentle nature know of love? You want the wild hot blood in your veins to feel the real fire of a lasting, devouring affection.
"I tell you I love him ten thousand times more than you do. Look at me, I am utterly lost and abased with my grief and humiliation. Am I not an object of pity? Geoffrey is dead, I tell you; I know it, I feel it. Love him as you do! And you stand there without so much as a single tear for his dear memory."