“You know why well enough,” she answered in a tone of bitter reproach.
“Because we are parted,” I said. “Well, Edith, I, too, regret it. But need we discuss that incident further? We are still friends, and I am glad that you have not passed through Paris without sparing an hour to call upon me.”
“But it is to discuss it that I came here,” she protested quickly. Her rich fur cape had slipped from her shoulders and lay behind her in my big armchair. In her black tailor-made gown and her elegant hat, which bore the unmistakable stamp of having been purchased since her arrival in Paris, she looked smart and attractive. Her pure, open face was exquisite to behold, even though a trifle thinner and paler than on that summer’s day when we had wandered by the river and she had pledged her love to me. But as she sat before me toying with her bracelet, from which a dozen little charms were hanging, the remembrance of her base deception flashed through my brain. I held her in suspicion—and suspicion of this kind is the seed of hatred.
“I cannot see what there is to discuss,” I answered coldly, at the same time ringing and ordering tea for her. “Nor can I see,” I added, “what good there is in reopening a chapter in our lives which ought to be for ever closed.”
“No, Gerald,” she cried, “don’t say that! Those words break my heart. It is not closed. You do not understand.”
“To speak of it only causes pain to both of us,” I said. “Cannot you visit me as a friend and resolve not to discuss the unfortunate affair?”
“No,” she declared quickly, “I cannot. I have come to you to-day, Gerald, to explain and to ask your forgiveness. My aunt is confined to her room with a headache, and I have managed to slip away from the hotel and come to you here.”
“Well?” I asked rather coldly.
I confess that her visit annoyed me, for I saw in her attitude a desire to make such explanations as would satisfy me; but, taught by experience, I was resolved to accept no word from her as the truth. She had deceived me once; and although she was the only woman I had really loved honestly and well, her wiles and fascinations had no longer any power over me.
“Gerald,” she exclaimed, as she rose suddenly, crossed the space between us, and, after placing her arms about my neck, sank upon her knees at my side, “I ask your forgiveness.”