Mrs. Robinson again got up. 'Surely,' she cried, 'you can understand how it is with me? You love Ludovic—supposing that you suddenly heard, now, that he was married—what would you do?—how would you feel?'
But Cecily, looking at her in dumb, agonized distress, made no answer.
'You are too kind to say so, but I know quite well what you would do. You would go away, and never see him again. It might kill you, but you would never do what you believed to be wrong.'
'Wrong for him, too,' the girl said, with difficulty.
'Well, I am not good, like you. If I had hesitated—and Cecily, believe me, I never did so, not for a moment—it would have been owing to mean, worldly considerations——'
'Do you, then, love him so very much?'
'Ah, my dear! Listen, Cecily, and I will tell you of our first meeting. It was in the Gare de Lyon, when we—Motey and I—were on our way to Pol les Thermes. I lost my purse, and he came forward, offered to lend me what I needed. Should I'—Penelope's voice altered, became curiously introspective, questioning—'should I have taken money from a stranger?' And then as Cecily looked at her, amazed, 'I tell you that from the moment our eyes met we knew one another in a more real sense than many lovers do after years of communion. My unhappiness the last few days has come from his absence, from the knowledge, too, that we are both to be tormented, as I am now being tormented—by you.' And, as Cecily made a gesture of protest, 'Yes, my dear, by you! Why, he has also been attacked by old Mr. Gumberg, of all people in the world!'
Penelope laughed nervously. She took the girl by the arm, and silently they retraced their footsteps through the quiet house—the silence broken at intervals by Cecily's long sighing sobs.
Some moments later, Wantley, going up to bed with uneasy mind, for he had heard the sound of Cecily's distress, met his cousin face to face. A white cloak concealed her figure, and a black silk hood her resplendent hair.
They looked at one another for a moment. Then very deliberately he spread out his arms, barring the way. 'You cannot, shall not go down to the Beach Room!' he whispered.