“I did n't read the letter. I never read his letters. I don't take them out of the envelopes. I destroy them.”
Herold stared in amazement. “Then how,” he cried, “do you know what you call the truth? What do you know?”
“He married a woman who is still alive. I know a great deal more,” she added, ingenuous still in her cold disdain.
“More?” His brain worked against baffling conjecture. Who could have told her? Suddenly his eyes caught the shadow of tragedy. He made a step forward and closed his hands on her arms, and even then he felt the shock and pain of their fragility. In London, a short time ago, they were round and delicately full.
“Stellamaris darling, tell me. It is I, Walter, who have loved you all your life, and to whom you have always told everything. Something none of us know has happened. What is it?”
She swayed back from him, and half closed her eyes.
“Let me go,” she said faintly. “Such things are not to be spoken of. They are not to be thought of. They only come in horrible dreams one can't help.”
He put an arm round her instinctively to save her from falling.
“Who told you? You must speak.”
She wrenched herself free and stood rigid again.