But this merely served to deepen the poignancy of the impending parting—for that she and Garth must part she recognized as inevitable.
Loving each other as men and women love but once in a lifetime, their love was destined to be for ever unconsummated. They were as irrevocably divided as though the seas of the entire world ran between them.
Wearily, in the flat, level tones of one who realizes that all hope is at an end, she stumbled through the few broken phrases which cancelled the whole happiness of life.
“It all seems so useless, doesn't it—your love and mine? . . . You've killed something that I felt for you—I don't quite know what to call it—respect, I suppose, only that sounds silly, because it was much more than that. I wish—I wish I didn't love you still. But perhaps that, too, will die in time. You see, you're not the man I thought I cared for. You're—you're something I'm ashamed to love—”
“That's enough!” he interrupted unsteadily. “Leave it at that. You won't beat it if you try till doomsday.”
The pain in his voice pierced her to the heart, and she made an impulsive step towards him, shocked into quick remorse.
“Garth . . . I didn't mean it!”
“Oh yes, you meant it,” he said. “Don't imagine that I'm blaming you. I'm not. You've found me out, that's all. And having discovered exactly how contemptible a person I am, you—very properly—send me away.”
He turned on his heel, giving her no time to reply, and a moment later she was alone. Then came the clang of the house door as it closed behind him. To Sara, it sounded like the closing of a door between two worlds—between the glowing past and the grey and empty future.