XXIX
Madame Zattiany did not utter a word during the short walk to her house. It was evident that she had dismissed the merry evening from her mind and was brooding on the coming hour. At the top of the steps she handed him the latchkey, but still lingered outside for a moment. As he took her hand and drew her gently into the house he felt that she was trembling.
"Come," he said, his own voice shaking. "Remember that you need tell me nothing unless you wish. This idea of confession before marriage is infernal rot. I have not the least intention of making one of my own."
"Oh!" She gave a short harsh laugh. "I should never dream of asking for any man's confession. They are all alike. And I must tell you. I cannot leave you to hear it from others."
He helped her out of her wrap and she threw the lace scarf on a chair and preceded him slowly down the hall.
"I am a coward. A coward," she thought heavily. "Have I ever felt moral cowardice before? I don't remember. Not toward any other man who loved me. But—— Oh, God! And I shall never see him again. How shall I begin?"
She was totally unprepared for the beginning. She heard him shut the library door, and then it seemed to her that her entire body was encircled by flexible hot bars of iron and her face, her mouth, were being flagellated. If he hadn't held her in that vise-like grip she would have fallen. She lay back on his arm as he kissed her and for the moment she forgot the past and the future and was happy, although she felt dimly that life was being drained out of her. She was passive in that fierce possessive embrace. She had lost all sense of separateness.
"I won't listen to your story," he muttered. "This is no time for talk."
His voice, hoarse and shaking as it was, broke the spell; with a sudden lithe movement she twisted herself out of his arms. Before he realized what was happening she had run across the room, snatched the key from the door and locked it on the other side. He heard her run up the stairs.