“It pleases you to think the worst, then?”
Gyp stopped the movement of her fingers and looked round at him.
“I've always told you you were perfectly free. Do you think I haven't felt it going on for months? There comes a moment when pride revolts—that's all. Don't lie to me, PLEASE!”
“I am not in the habit of lying.” But still he did not go. That awful feeling of encirclement, of a net round him, through which he could not break—a net which he dimly perceived even in his resentment to have been spun by himself, by that cursed intimacy, kept from her all to no purpose—beset him more closely every minute. Could he not make her see the truth, that it was only her he REALLY loved? And he said:
“Gyp, I swear to you there's nothing but one kiss, and that was not—”
A shudder went through her from head to foot; she cried out:
“Oh, please go away!”
He went up to her, put his hands on her shoulders, and said:
“It's only you I really love. I swear it! Why don't you believe me? You must believe me. You can't be so wicked as not to. It's foolish—foolish! Think of our life—think of our love—think of all—” Her face was frozen; he loosened his grasp of her, and muttered: “Oh, your pride is awful!”
“Yes, it's all I've got. Lucky for you I have it. You can go to her when you like.”