Pouting and rebellious, Ivy stared at her shoes and bit at the border of a crumpled handkerchief:
“I won’t!”
“My dear, you must! However much you love him, he’s not worth having unless he loves you. What can you do to make him?”
“I’ll publish the engagement!”
“And if he contradicts it?”
“He wouldn’t! He couldn’t! He couldn’t be such a brute!” She was startled by her own vehemence and repeated in a whisper more poignant than the cry: “Oh, he couldn’t!”
Eric looked at her and walked away to the window. Pillowing his chin on his arms, he stared into the lifeless street below. Somewhere in the silent flat a clock struck twelve; a second and a third joined in with softly discordant chimes, and he realized that he had been sprawling there in mental catalepsy for ten minutes....
“From your account—you’ve told me everything, I take it—?” he asked uncertainly.
“Everything!”
He shrugged his shoulders and turned back to the room, avoiding her eyes because he knew that she was lying. There was no proof, but her desperate intensity convinced him, and he wondered why he had not guessed before.