“But have you a home?”
“The Western World,” he smiled with a fine bitterness that hurt her. “I am a Jew, you know.”
“Yes ... I know,” she hushed.
“The first Jew you have ever known?”
“The first....”
“Do you know me, Fanny?”
“Will I ever know?... You are going away.”
“That is right, also.”
“Yes.” She looked at him. She sat high above his prone strong body; looked at him. “Yes, it is right. I look at you. You are beautiful. You are clean. You are wilful and straight. You have black curling hair like a savage dance all over the white tenderness of your body. You have eyes that look forever. Yet I do not love you. I love my husband. He is weak and dirty. Until you came I said: ‘He is weak and dirty, I hate him.’ You came with your clear strength. You took me naked. I took you naked. Because I have taken you clean and strong I know that it is he whom I love.”
He held her hand.