'Ah, Chloe, to give one's life! And it is your happiness I have sought more than your favor.'
'I believe it; but I have not liked the means. You leave us to-morrow?'
'It seems to me that to-morrow is the term.'
Her face clouded. 'That tells me a very uncertain promise.'
'You looked forth to a month of happiness—meaning a month of delusion. The delusion expires to-night. You will awaken to see your end of it in the morning. You have never looked beyond the month since the day of his arrival.'
'Let him not be named, I supplicate you.'
'Then you consent that another shall be sacrificed for you to enjoy your state of deception an hour longer?'
'I am not deceived, sir. I wish for peace, and crave it, and that is all
I would have.'
'And you make her your peace-offering, whom you have engaged to serve! Too surely your eyes have been open as well as mine. Knot by knot— I have watched you—where is it?—you have marked the points in that silken string where the confirmation of a just suspicion was too strong for you.'
'I did it, and still I continued merry?' She subsided from her scornfulness on an involuntary 'Ah!' that was a shudder.