That sound was followed by silence. Was she perhaps indignant, he asked himself, that he should dare to make this demand upon her attention? She would have a right to be; for he could make no pretense that he had not deliberately intended to do this. Yet she was alone there, sad and troubled, and he was close at hand, with a heart that ached to comfort her. He could not have rested, feeling that she was unaware of his knowledge of her presence, and no matter what consequences to himself the act might carry, he deliberately said to her in that sound: “I am here, and I know that you are there.”
If she had made a sign in answer, he would have thanked God on his knees; but she had withdrawn from the window in silence, and he had felt only that she was gone.
An hour later, when the servant brought his coffee and the morning papers, he brought also the information that the princess had gone off alone some time before in a cab.
Harold felt, at hearing this, a perfect fury of anger and indignation. With the possibility of a riot in view, and the knowledge that ladies had been warned not to venture unprotected on the streets, it made his blood boil to think she—the delicate woman-spirit and woman-body that he knew so well—should have gone forth alone from under the very roof with him; and that even if he had known of it, he would have had no right to interfere. The legal right, of course, he had; but that fact only made it the more impossible for him to assert upon her any claim. Not all the laws that were ever made could have bound or loosed him so indomitably as did her wish and will. The fact that it was still within his power to assert a legal claim upon her constituted in itself the strongest possible demand upon a man of his nature to leave her as free as air from any bondage or emancipation which could exist by any right but that of love. If she had loved him, he would have asserted his power and right to control and influence her. As she did not love him, there was no creature living who was so free from him as she—this woman whom once he had held in as binding fetters as ever love had forged.
XVII
On reaching home, Sonia went immediately to her room, and sent word to her aunt that she was feeling ill, and desired not to be disturbed. Her maid brought her a message of condolence in reply, and she knew that she was now safe in her solitude for the remainder of the day.
She undressed quickly, threw on a loose dressing-gown, unfastened the thick coil of her hair, and then, telling her maid not to come to the room until she should ring, she threw herself at full length on the lounge, and lay there with her eyes closed, profoundly still. She had caused the blinds to be shut and the curtains drawn. The beautiful spring sunshine flooded everything without, but about her all was gloom and darkness. She could hear the whir of innumerable wheels and the click of horses’ feet on the smooth pavement outside, and she knew that the streets were alive and abloom with smartly dressed men and women in open carriages, driving between the long lines of flowering horse-chestnuts down the beautiful Champs Elysées to the Palais de l’Industrie.
Long ago she had ordered a charming costume for this occasion, selected with much care and thought; and it had come home more than a realization of her expectations. She had fancied that she would have pleasure in joining a party of friends, and perhaps lingering about the neighborhood of her own picture to hear any comments that might be made upon it. She had not allowed herself to hope that it would be on the line; but there it was this moment, as she knew; and the pretty gown and bonnet and parasol, all so painstakingly selected, were neatly put away, and she was lying nerveless in this lonely room.
She lay on her back, with her arms, from which the sleeves fell, thrown over her head, and her face turned to one side, so that her cheek rested against the smooth flesh of one inner arm. The folds of her scant gown lay thin and pliant over her long, slim figure, and the pointed toes of her little gray mules showed at the end of the lounge where her feet were crossed one over the other. To-day she had given up the long, long struggle for self-control and strength. She abandoned herself absolutely to the dark, unbroken grief which she felt to be her only natural and honest life. She did not even long for happiness to-day: she longed only for the peace of death—the nothingness of the grave. Oh, to be taken so, without the need to stir or move, and lowered into a cool, deep, still grave,—breath, consciousness, hope, regret, memory, individuality, all, all gone,—and earth and grass and flowers over her! That instinct of weak self-pity, to which the strongest of us yield now and then, overcame the lethargy of her mood, and the springs of tears were touched. Two large drops rose and forced their way between her close-shut lids.
“O, what have I done, what have I done, to have to suffer so?” she whispered—“to have to give up all, all joy, and take only pain and misery and regret for all my life! It was only a mistake. It was no sin or crime that I committed when I sent him away, and said that I did not love him. It was only an awful, fatal, terrible mistake. I have feared so for a long, long time; but, oh! I know it now! I want him back—I want him back! I want his love, and his patience, and his care. I want him for my friend, and my protector, and my husband. And though I want him so, I am farther away from him than if I had never seen him. When this hideous divorce is got, and our beautiful marriage has been undone, any other woman in the world might hope to win his love. I shall be the one free woman on earth to whom that hope would be shame and outrage and humiliation. O my God, help me, help me! Show me what to do. Give me back at least my pride, that I may not have to suffer his contempt. O God Almighty, if his love for me is quite, quite dead, in mercy let my love for him die too! Oh, no—no—no! My God, I take it back! I do not ask it. I do not want to stop this agony of pain that comes from loving him. O God of pity and compassion, give me now a little help, and show me what to do. Kill me now—strike me dead, O God—rather than let me do anything to cause him to despise me!”