“Which of those meanings makes the pleasure of her life?” he wondered. “Which of them might have made the pleasure of mine?” He closed the dictionary in contempt. “The very man whose business is to explain it, tries seven different ways, and doesn’t explain it after all. And yet, there is such a thing.” He reached that conclusion unwillingly and angrily. For the first time, a doubt about himself forced its way into his mind. Might he have looked higher than his torture-table and his knife? Had he gained from his life all that his life might have given to him?
Left by herself, Zo began to grow tired of it. She tried to get Carmina for a companion. “Come and look out of window,” she said.
Carmina gently refused: she was unwilling to be disturbed. Since she had spoken to Benjulia, her thoughts had been dwelling restfully on Ovid. In another day she might be on her way to him. When would Teresa come?
Benjulia was too preoccupied to notice her. The weak doubt that had got the better of his strong reason, still held him in thrall. “Love!” he broke out, in the bitterness of his heart. “It isn’t a question of sentiment: it’s a question of use. Who is the better for love?”
She heard the last words, and answered him. “Everybody is the better for it.” She looked at him with sorrowful eyes, and laid her hand on his arm. “Everybody,” she added, “but you.”
He smiled scornfully. “Everybody is the better for it,” he repeated. “And who knows what it is?”
She drew away her hand, and looked towards the heavenly tranquillity of the evening sky.
“Who knows what it is?” he reiterated.
“God,” she said.
Benjulia was silent.