"He is at the age when he admires rouge and paint," mocked Esmé. "He'll make me My Lady, and Society will be glad to know me again. I'm sick of being no one, of seeing glum looks and tracking round with fifth-rate women. Come, Bertie! It's easily arranged."
As swift hands rub blurred glass, so that one can see clearly through what was dim, Esmé's words let the man's mental eyes look across the future.
Estelle, his pure little Estelle! This painted, haggard woman would make a cat's-paw of her, drag her shamed name into the maw of the press, and stand aloof herself, an injured wife. And he—he—in his madness had been about to help her. Hidden by glamour of passion, how different it had been to this standing naked, showing its distorted limbs. Let sorrow come or go, he knew that he would not now drag the woman he loved into sinning. These are the world's laws, men say, yet surely God's laws also, since to break them means remorse and punishment. Slight bonds of custom, but holding sane humanity.
"You have a curious mind," he said at last. "My God, have you no sense of right or wrong, Esmé—no shade of decency left?"
"Oh, leave sermons to the Church," she said roughly.
"And supposing"—he got up, stood facing her, man baited, driven to bay—"I were to divorce you, my wife?"
"You can't," she said coolly. "If I stay out all night it's with companions. And look here, Bertie, I am sick of it all. I say, let me divorce you, or I'll take proceedings myself. If you are wise any woman of the streets will serve your purpose; if you are not, your pure Estelle's name will be in every paper. See!"
She tossed a photograph across to him. A glimpse of sea and cliff, and two people asleep, lying close to a bank. Their faces were clear; the girl, lying back, had one hand outstretched; the man, his face against the bank, had his upon it.
"Repose," said Esmé, coarse meaning in her voice, as every shade of colour whickered from her husband's face. "Repose by the sea."
The girl's face was Estelle Reynolds; the man's his own.