The young man had drawn a chair up to the near side of the little table. Now he leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, both hands extended, as one who offers a petition.
"Do not reproach me with my silence or I shall be broken-hearted," he said. "My inclination was to write reams to you, volumes. I did, in fact, begin many letters. But I restrained myself. I destroyed them. To have sent them would have been selfish and indiscreet. I was bound, by my promise to you at parting, not to allude to the subject which most vitally touches my happiness. And I found over there so much which was perplexing and sad. I asked myself what right I had to inflict upon you a recital of melancholy impressions and events. I came to the conclusion that I really had none."
Madame St. Leger looked at him sideways from between half-closed eyelids. The dimple showed in her cheek, but her smile was distinctly ironic.
"Why not admit that I was right in foretelling that you would find those shadowy ladies, and your mission to them, of absorbing interest? It occupied your time and thoughts to the exclusion of all else—now, was it not so? Was I not right?"
"Yes and no, chère Madame," he answered, presently, slowly and with so perceptible a change of tone that his hearer was startled to the point of finding it difficult to go on with her needlework.
Adrian sat silently watching her. The singular character of her beauty, both in its subtlety and suggestion of a reserve of moral force, had never been more evident to him. More than ever, in each gesture, in the long, suave lines of her body and limbs shrouded in clinging black, in the gleam of her furrowed hair as she turned or bent her charming head, in the abiding provocation and mystery of her eyes and lips, did she appear to him unique and infinitely desirable. Watching her, he inclined to become lyrical and cry aloud his worship in heroic fashion, careless of twentieth-century decorum and restraint. But if her room, the material frame and setting of that beauty, to his immense content remained unchanged in every particular, her attitude of mind, to his immense discontent, evidently remained unchanged likewise. In the first surprise of his arrival she had yielded somewhat, catching alight from his flame. But with a determined hand she shut down those sympathetic fires, becoming obdurate as before. He could feel her will sensibly stiffening against his own; and this at once hurt him shrewdly and whipped up passion, preaching a reckless war of conquest, bidding him disregard promises, bidding him speak and thunder down opposition by sheer law of the strongest. In every man worth the name temptation must arise, at moments, to beat the defiant beloved object into an obedient and docile jelly—the defiant beloved object, it may confidently be added, would regard any man as unworthy of serious consideration did it not. But, in Adrian's case, sitting watching her now, though such temptation did very really arise, its duration was brief. Less primitive counsels prevailed. She was far from kind and he was hotly in love; but he was also the child of his age, and a fine gentleman at that, to whom, given time for reflection, berserker methods must inevitably present themselves as both unworthy and ludicrous. So, if she condemned him to play a waiting game, he would bow to her ruling and play it. He had considerable capital of self-confidence to draw upon. In as far as the ultimate issues were concerned he wasn't a bit afraid—as yet. He could afford, so he believed, to wait. Only, since tormenting was about, all the fun of that amiable pastime shouldn't be on her side. And to this end now he would make her speak first.
He remained silent, therefore, still observing her, until the color deepened in the round of her cheeks, and the stitches were set less regularly in the white work, while uneasiness gained on her causing her presently to look up.
"Yes and no?" she said, "yes and no? That is nothing of an answer. I am all attention. I am curious to hear your explanation. And then—yes and no—what next?"
"This," he replied, "that on nearer acquaintance the two ladies proved anything but shadowy. They proved, in some respects, even a little tremendous. Far from being absorbed in them, I came alarmingly near being absorbed by them—which is a very different matter."
"Ah, that is interesting. You did not like them?"