Estelle turned very white.
"I'm tired," he said drearily. "I feel as if the fates had drubbed me mentally, until my sore mind aches. We'll get another vase, Estelle"—for she was picking up the pieces with shaking fingers. "And I tell you, I have come to you to be mended," he went on, almost pitifully.
"But I—what can I do?" she whispered.
The room faded; she saw the open sea shimmering blue and green and opal; she felt again the love she had hoped she had fought down and put away.
"You can stop pretending," he said. "You can give me a little comfort, Estelle, a little love. I have lost faith in everything except you. And—I love you, Estelle," he added gravely.
The rush of mingled joy and sorrow made the girl gasp.
"But Esmé?" she whispered.
"Esmé was a will-o'-the-wisp—a false light on a marsh. You are the solid world. Estelle, I don't know where I am. Esmé has made a fool of me—and I can never care for her again. Will you help me—or see me go to the dogs alone?"
The cunning of man, turning the mother-love in woman, which he knows is stronger than passion, to his own ends. Man triumphant, merry, full of strength and hope, she may resist; but man broken, pitiful, needing her, is irresistible.
Bertie had sat down on the brown sofa; he was looking at her with dazed eyes.