This time he could not be sure. A kind of wisdom was in her eyes that had never been there before. It might be only that she was on her guard, knowing the secret he was after.
Conversation suffered many lapses. There seemed so little they could talk about. All the three of them had in common was reminiscent; and reminiscences were taboo. After supper they sat as far apart as three persons could in the small front room,—Thane in his big chair, Agnes in a stiff chair with some needlework over which her head was bent. Her knees were crossed. The men were fascinated by the swift, delicate, tantalizing, puncturing rhythm of her needle, and in the margin of John’s vision was exactly all she meant to be seen of a small silk-clad ankle and slippered foot.
If it was as he suspected, how could Thane endure it?
“We are very quiet,” she said, not looking up.
At that John began to talk about Thane,—of his work and the genius showing in it, of the methods he had evolved, of the things he had invented, of his way with his men and what a brilliant future he had. Agnes listened attentively, even tensely, as he could see, but made no comment; and Thane, sinking lower and lower in his chair, became intolerably embarrassed. He stopped it by beginning of a sudden to talk about John. He knew much less about John’s work, however, than John knew about his. For that reason the narrative fell into generalities and was not convincing. Agnes listened for a while and became restive. Suddenly she put her needlework away and asked if anyone would like refreshments. John looked at the time. It was past eleven o’clock and he arose to go. Thane would have detained him; Agnes politely regretted that he had to go so soon. Still, when she shook hands with him at the door her manner was spontaneous and warm and she pressed him to come again.
John walked about in the night without any mind at all. When his thoughts became coherent he found himself saying: “No. They are not man and wife. They are strangers. I wonder what goes on in that house. Why does she do it?... Why does she do it?”
Why did she?
XXVII
As the door closed behind their visitor Agnes turned without speaking and went back to the front room where she sat at a little desk to write in a large black book. This was the last thing she did each day.