She rose, too, almost with a synchronous movement. An interested spectator, I continued sitting, my hands clasped round my knees.
"The little prison you put me into. I felt this in my throat"—and forgetful of the admirable Mrs. Considine's discipline she mimed her words startlingly—"I was sick—sick—sick to death. You forget, Jaff Chayne, the mountains of Albania."
"Perhaps I did," said he, with his steady eyes fixed on her. "But I remember 'em now. Would you like to go back?"
She put her hands for a few seconds before her face, as though to hide swift visions of slaughtered enemies, then dashed them away. "No. Not now. Not after—No. But mountains, freedom—anything unlike prison. Oh, I've gone mad sometimes. I've wanted to take up a fender and smash things."
"I've felt like that myself," said Jaffery.
"And what have you done?"
"I've broken out of prison and run away."
"That's what I did," said Liosha.
Then Jaffery burst into his great laugh and held her hands and looked at her with kindly, sympathetic mirth in his eyes. And Liosha laughed, too.
"We're both of us savages under our skins, old lady. That's what it comes to."