If Winston had never entertained a favorable opinion of his own sagacity prior to hearing this avowal, it would have forced itself upon him now. How timely was the thought, how felicitous the accident, that had aided him to ward off the disaster of renewed intercourse!
Involuntarily his fingers crept nearer to the closed portfolio.
“No good could have come of that!” returned he coldly. “When an amputation is to be performed, wise people submit to it without useless preliminaries. The exchange of farewells in this case would be inexpedient in the highest degree. You would compromise yourself by continued acknowledgment of this fellow's acquaintance. My will is that you and the world should forget, as soon as it can be done, that you ever saw or heard of him. The connection was degrading.”
“Don't abuse him, brother! Let the knowledge that we are parted forever, satisfy your resentment. Since he has not appealed to me from your verdict, I am left to suppose that, upon second thoughts, he has resolved to acquiesce in your will. I do not blame him for the change of purpose.” Still impassive in feature and voice, still not withdrawing her fixed gaze from that one point upon the floor. “He, too, has pride, and it matches yours. I do not say mine. I question, sometimes, if I have any.”
“If your conjecture be correct, you cannot object to return the letters you have already received from him,” said Winston, pressing on to the conclusion of a disagreeable business. “Since you are not likely to add to your stock of these valuables, you do not care to retain them, I suppose? I believe the rule is total surrender of souvenirs when a rupture is pronounced hopeless.”
“I shall keep them a week longer!”
She assigned no reason for the resolution, and her manner, without being sullen, aggravated her brother into wrath, the effusion of which was a withering sneer.
“Your hope in his repentance is creditable to the strength—or weakness—of woman's love. But have your way. The illustrious record of his former life is a powerful argument in favor of clemency. In a week, then!”
He nodded dismissal, wheeled his chair around to the table, dipped a pen in the standish, and pulled an account-book toward him.
He was surprised and not pleased, nevertheless, that Mabel retired without other reply than a simple “Good-night,” said without temper, or any evidence of excitement. A month before, a milder sarcasm, the lightest breath of reproof, would have brought her to his feet in a paroxysm of tears, to implore pardon for her contumacy, and to promise obedience for all time to come. She was getting beyond his control the while she offered no open resistance to his government. Was sorrowful shame, or her infatuation for the adventurer he cursed in his heart by his gods, the influence that was petrifying her into this unlovely caricature of her once bright and affectionate self?