“Not anything,” she repeated. “Not anything in the world. Nothing could change me.”
“And you wouldn’t mind going away from here with me?”
“No.... I’d like that. It’s what I have always wanted. I’d be glad to go away.”
“Even to the Argentine?”
“Anywhere ... anywhere at all.”
“We can be married very soon ... before I leave ... and then we can go to Paris to see my mother.” He sat up abruptly with an odd, troubled look on his face. “She’s a wonderful woman, darling ... beautiful and kind and charming.”
“I thought she was lovely ... that day in Paris ... the most fascinating woman I’d ever seen, Jean dear.”
He seemed not to be listening to her. The wind was beginning to die away with the heat of the afternoon, and far out on the amethyst sea the two sailing ships lay becalmed and motionless. Even the leaves of the twisted wild-cherry tree hung listlessly in the hot air. All the world about them had turned still and breathless.
Turning, he took both her hands and looked at her. “There’s something I must tell you ... Sybil ... something you may not like. But you mustn’t let it make any difference.... In the end things like that don’t matter.”
She interrupted him. “If it’s about women ... I don’t care. I know what you are, Jean.... I’ll never know any better than I know now.... I don’t care.”