He was silent, looking towards her. She was wearing a very dark blue tea-gown of some thin material in which her thin body seemed lost. He saw the dark folds of it flowing over the divan on which she was leaning, and trailing to the rug at her feet. Her face was a faint whiteness under her colorless hair. Her eyes were two darknesses in it. He could not see them distinctly, but he knew they were looking intent and distressed.
“Haven’t you told me I look punished?” said the husky voice.
“Are you unhappy?” he asked.
“Do you think I have much reason to be happy?”
“You have your boy.”
“For a few weeks in the year. I have lost my husband in a horrible way, worse than if he had died. I live entirely alone. I can’t marry again. And yet I’m not at all old, and not at all finished. But perhaps you have never really thought about my situation seriously. After all, why should you? Why should any one? I won my case, and so of course it’s all right.”
“Are you unhappy, then?”
“What do you suppose about me?”
“I know you’ve gone through a great deal. But you have your boy.”
There was a sound almost of dull obstinacy in his voice.