“You are willing that God above should never grant you another minute of peace, if you have been lying to me? Do you wish that, Dorothea?”
Dorothea balked; she blinked a little. Then she said quite softly: “Those are terrible words, Daniel. But if you insist upon it, I am willing to abide by the curse you have made a possibility.”
Daniel breathed a breath of relief. He felt that a mighty load had been taken from his heart. And in grateful emotion he went up to his wife, and pressed her to his bosom.
But at the same time he was repelled by something. He felt that the creature he was pressing to his heart was without rhythm, or vibration, or law, or order. He began again to be gnawed at by torture, this time of a new species and coming from another direction.
As he opened the door to the hall, he heard a rustle; and he saw a dark figure hastening over to the room that opened on the court.
V
Left alone, Dorothea stared for a while into space, as motionless as a statue. Then she took her violin and bow from the case—she had bought a new bow to take the place of the one that had been broken—and began to play: a cadence, a trill, a waltz. Her face took on a hardened, resolute expression.
She soon let the instrument fall from her hands, and began to think. She laid the violin to one side, took off her slippers, sneaked out of the room in her stocking feet and across the hall, and listened at the door to Philippina’s room. She opened it cautiously and heard a sound snoring from Philippina’s bed, which stood next to the door.
The lamp had almost burned down; it gave so little light that the bed clothes could hardly be seen.