Her voice sounded like that of a pleading child.
"I want some air."
"You want ..."
She did not finish her sentence, suddenly choking with anger. On the top floor—she knew it—the old servant-maid was standing with her door ajar, laughing and grinning. She knew it. She felt stifled with rage, with nervous rage; she quivered all over her body, shivering in her night-dress. The hall-door had opened and shut. Steyn was outside; and she ... she was still standing on the stairs above. She clenched her fists, she panted; she could have run after him, in her night-dress; the big tears sprang from her child-eyes; but, ashamed because of the maid, she went back to her room.
She cried, cried very softly, so as not to let the maid hear, so that the maid should not have that added enjoyment. Oh, that pain, that sting, here, in her heart, a physical pain, a physical pain! No one who did not feel it as she did could know the physical pain which it gave her, the sort of pain one describes to a doctor. Where could Steyn be going? He was still so young, he still looked so well-set-up. And yet he was her husband, her husband! Oh, why had he not remained nice to her, old though she was? She never even felt the touch of his hand now! And how at one time she had felt that touch tingle through all her being! Oh, never again, never even a kiss, a kind kiss, such as old people still exchange at times!
She did not go to bed; she waited up. Would Steyn come back soon? Was that ... was that he coming now? No, it was Lot: it was his key she heard, his lighter footstep.
And she opened the door:
"Lot!"
"Mummy, aren't you in bed yet?"
"No, dear. Lot, Lot, come here!"