“Do you suppose, my dear, I don’t know that? If it could be, do you think I should regret losing my self-control?”
She said. “If it’s any consolation to you—perhaps I lost mine too. We’re both human. Perhaps a woman is even more so than a man. That’s why I went away in October—things were getting impossible——”
“Good God!” he exclaimed, “I thought you were bored to death!”
A little laugh could not be restrained. The blindness of man to psychological phenomena is ever a subject for woman’s sweet or bitter mirth. But it was not in his heart to respond.
“Then you do care for me a little?”
“I shouldn’t be standing here with you now, if I didn’t. I shouldn’t have made the mistake of coming back, if I hadn’t wanted to see you.”
“Mistake?” He sighed and turned a step away. “Yes. I suppose it was. I should have been frank with Mary and shewn her that it was impossible—for me.”
“It would be best for me to go to-morrow,” said Olivia.
“Where?”
“London. A hotel. Any old branch.” She smiled. “I must settle down somewhere sooner or later. The sooner the better.”