“To force yourself on me.”
“Yes.”
“You know the meaning of the term ‘effective occupation’? Having marched in, how could you have held your position, unless”—
“Oh, a man doesn’t necessarily drive a woman away because he isn’t in love with her.”
“Yet that was what you thought I had done to you last night.”
“Yes, but I didn’t suppose you would take the trouble to do it again. And if you had, I should have only loved you the more. I thought you would most likely be rather amused, rather touched, by my importunity. I thought you would take a listless advantage, make a plaything of me—the diversion of a few idle hours in summer, and then, when you had tired of me, would cast me aside, forget me, break my heart. I desired nothing better than that. That is what I must have been vaguely hoping for. But I had no definite scheme. I wanted to be with you and I came to you. It seems years ago, now! How my heart beat as I waited on the doorstep! ‘Is his Grace at home?’ ‘I don’t know. I’ll inquire. What name shall I say?’ I saw in the girl’s eyes that she, too, loved you. Have YOU seen that?”
“I have never looked at her,” said the Duke.
“No wonder, then, that she loves you,” sighed Zuleika. “She read my secret at a glance. Women who love the same man have a kind of bitter freemasonry. We resented each other. She envied me my beauty, my dress. I envied the little fool her privilege of being always near to you. Loving you, I could conceive no life sweeter than hers—to be always near you; to black your boots, carry up your coals, scrub your doorstep; always to be working for you, hard and humbly and without thanks. If you had refused to see me, I would have bribed that girl with all my jewels to cede me her position.”
The Duke made a step towards her. “You would do it still,” he said in a low voice.
Zuleika raised her eyebrows. “I would not offer her one garnet,” she said, “now.”