and she told her story, detail by detail, omitting nothing, exaggerating nothing, speaking slowly, clearly, with precision, aware that the bare facts were her strongest argument.
Amherst, as he listened, shifted his position once, raising his hand so that it screened his face; and in that attitude he remained when she had ended.
As she waited for him to speak, Justine realized that her heart had been alive with tremulous hopes. All through her narrative she had counted on a murmur of perception, an exclamation of pity: she had felt sure of melting the stony image. But Amherst said no word.
At length he spoke, still without turning his head. “You have not told me why you kept this from me.”
A sob formed in her throat, and she had to wait to steady her voice.
“No—that was my wrong—my weakness. When I did it I never thought of being afraid to tell you—I had talked it over with you in my own mind…so often…before….”
“Well?”
“Then– when you came back it was harder…though I was still sure you would approve me.”
“Why harder?”
“Because at first—at Lynbrook—I
“And afterward?”
She had shrunk in advance from this question, and she could not answer it at once. To gain time she echoed it. “Afterward?”
“Did it never occur to you, when we met later—when you first went to Mr. Langhope–-“?
“To tell you then? No—because by that time I had come to see that I could never be quite sure of making you understand. No one who was not there at the time could know what it was to see her suffer.”
“You thought it all over, then—decided definitely against telling me?”
“I did not have to think long. I felt I had done right—I still feel so—and I was sure you would feel so, if you were in the same circumstances.”
There was another pause. Then Amherst said: “And last September—at Hanaford?”
It was the word for which she had waited—the word of her inmost fears. She felt the blood mount to her face.
“Did you see no difference—no special reason for telling me then?”
“Yes–-” she faltered.
“Yet you said nothing.”
“No.”
Silence again. Her eyes strayed to the clock, and some dim association of ideas told her that Cicely would soon be coming in.
“Why did you say nothing?”
He lowered his hand and turned toward her as he spoke; and she looked up and faced him.
“Because I regarded the question as settled. I had decided it in my own mind months before, and had never regretted my decision. I should have thought it morbid…unnatural…to go over the whole subject again…to let it affect a situation that had come about…so much later…so unexpectedly.”
“Did you never feel that, later, if I came to know—if others came to know—it might be difficult–-?”
“No; for I didn’t care for the others—and I believed that, whatever your own feelings were, you would know I had done what I thought right.”
She spoke the words proudly, strongly, and for the first time the hard lines of his face relaxed, and a slight tremor crossed it.
“If you believed this, why have you been letting that cur blackmail you?”
“Because when he began I saw for the first time that what I had done might be turned against me by—by those who disliked our marriage. And I was afraid for my happiness. That was my weakness…it is what I am suffering for now.”
“
“That day—last month—when you asked me for money…was it…?”
“Yes–-” she said, her head sinking.
He laughed. “You couldn’t tell me—but you could use my money to bribe that fellow to conspire with you!”
“I had none of my own.”
“No—nor I either! You used
Justine had risen also, and she stood motionless, her hands clasped against her breast, in the drawn shrinking attitude of a fugitive overtaken by a blinding storm. He moved back to her with an appealing gesture.
“And you didn’t see—it didn’t occur to you—that your doing…as you did…was an obstacle—an insurmountable
