As she thought of him more life quickened in her mind.
Since her accident he had written to her several times, ardent, tender letters, recalling all he had said to her, recounting again his adoration of her for her nature, her soul, the essence of her, the woman in her, telling her that this terror which had come upon her only made her dearer to him, that—as she knew—he had impiously dared almost to long for it, as for an order of release that would take effect in the liberation of her true self.
These letters she had read, but they had not stirred her. She had told herself that Robin did not know, that he was a self-deceiver, that he did not understand his own nature, which was allied to the nature of every living man. But now, seeking some, even the smallest solace in the intense agony of desolation that was upon her, she caught—in her bleeding woman’s heart—at this hand stretched out from Rome. She got up, went to her bedroom, unlocked her despatch-box, took out these letters of Robin’s. They had not stirred her, yet she had kept them. Now she came down once more to the piazza, sat by the tea-table, opened them, read them, re-read them, whispered them over again and again. Something she must have; some hand she must catch at. She could not die in this freezing cold which she had never known, this cold that came out of the Inferno, at whose cavern mouth she stood. And Robin said he was there—Robin said he was there.
She did not love Robin. It seemed to her now that it would be grotesque for her to love any man. Her face was not meant for love. But as she read these ardent, romantic letters, written since the tragedy that had overtaken her, she began to ask herself, with a fierce anxiety, whether what Robin affirmed could be the truth? Was he unlike other men? Was his nature capable of a devotion of the soul to another soul, of a devotion to which any physical ugliness, even any physical horror, would count as nothing?
After that last scene with Fritz she felt as if he were no longer her husband, as if he were only a man who had fled from her in fear. She did not think any more of his rights, her duties. He had abandoned his rights. What duties could she have towards a man who was frightened when he looked at her? And indeed all the social and moral questions to which the average woman of the world pays—because she must pay—attention had suddenly ceased to exist for Lady Holme. She was no longer a woman of the world. All worldly matters had sunk down beneath her feet with her lost beauty. She had wanted to be free. Well, now she was surely free. Who would care what she did in the future?
Robin said he was there.
She thought that, unless she could feel that in world there was one man who wanted to take care of her, she must destroy herself. The thought grew in her as she sat there, till she said to herself, “If it is true what he says, perhaps I shall be able to live. If it is not true—” She looked over the stone balustrade at the grey waters of the lake. Twilight was darkening over them.
Late that evening, when she was sitting in the big drawing-room staring at the floor, the butler came in with a telegram. She opened it and read:
“Sir Donald has told me you are at Casa Felice; arrive to-morrow
from Rome—ROBIN.”
“No answer,” she said.