“I stopped at once—definitely. You must please believe that. Presently you will see why I say this.”
All the time she had been standing quietly by the mantelpiece. Now she came across and kneeled down beside David’s chair. She laid her hands one above the other upon the broad arm, and she looked, not at David at all, but at her own hands. It was the penitent’s attitude, but David Blake, looking at her, found nothing of the penitent’s expression. The light shone full upon her face. There was a look upon it that startled him. Her face was white and still. The look that riveted David’s attention was a look of remoteness—passionless remoteness—and over all a sort of patience.
Elizabeth looked down at her strong folded hands, and began to speak in a quiet, gentle voice. The sapphire in her ring caught the light.
“David, just now you asked me why I married you. You never asked me that before. I am going to tell you now. I married you because I loved you very much. I thought I could help, and I loved you. That is why I married you. You won’t speak, please, till I have done. It isn’t easy.”
She drew a long, steady breath and went on.
“I knew you didn’t love me, you loved Mary. It wasn’t good for you. I knew that you would never love me. I was—content—with friendship. You gave me friendship. Then we came home. And you stopped loving Mary. I was very thankful—for you—not for myself.”
She stopped for a moment. David was looking at her. Her words fell on his heart, word after word, like scalding tears. So she had loved him—it only needed that. Why did she tell him now when it was all too late—hideously too late?
Elizabeth went on.
“Do you remember, when we had been home a week, you dreamed your dream? Your old dream—you told me of it, one evening—but I knew already——”
“Knew?”