And it was he who had brought her to this by his cruelty, his obtuseness, his base readiness to believe the worst of her! He did not want to pour himself out in self-accusation—that seemed too easy a way of escape. He wanted simply to take her in his arms, to ask her to give him one more chance—and then to show her! And all the while he was paralyzed by the group in the window.
“Can’t we go out? I must speak to you,” he began again nervously.
“Not this afternoon—the doctor is coming. Tomorrow–-“
“I can’t wait for tomorrow!”
She made a faint, imperceptible gesture, which read to his eyes: “You’ve waited a whole year.”
“Yes, I know,” he returned, still constrained by the necessity of muffling his voice, of perpetually measuring the distance between themselves and the window. “I know what you might say—don’t you suppose I’ve said it to myself a million times? But I didn’t know—I couldn’t imagine–-“
She interrupted him with a rapid movement. “What do you know now?”
“What you promised Langhope–-“
She turned her startled eyes on him, and he saw the blood run flame-like under her skin. “But
“He hasn’t—to me. But such things make themselves known. Should you have been content to go on in that way forever?”
She raised her head and her eyes rested in his. “If you were,” she answered simply.
“Justine!”
Again she checked him with a silencing motion. “Please tell me just what has happened.”
“Not now—there’s too much else to say. And nothing matters except that I’m with you.”
“But Mr. Langhope–-“
“He asks you to come. You’re to see Cicely tomorrow.”
Her lower lip trembled a little, and a tear flowed over and hung on her lashes.
“But what does all that matter now? We’re together after this horrible year,” he insisted.
She looked at him again. “But what is really changed?”
“Everything—everything! Not changed, I mean—just gone back.”
“To where…we were…before?” she whispered; and he whispered back: “To where we were before.”
There was a scraping of chairs on the floor, and with a sense of release Amherst saw that the colloquy in the window was over.
The two visitors, gathering their wraps about them, moved slowly across the room, still talking to the matron in excited undertones, through which, as they neared the threshold, the younger woman’s staccato again broke out.
“I tell you, if she does go back to him, it’ll never be the same between them!”
“Oh, Cora, I wouldn’t say that,” the other ineffectually wailed; then they moved toward the door, and a moment later it had closed on them.
Amherst turned to his wife with outstretched arms. “Say you forgive me, Justine!”
She held back a little from his entreating hands, not reproachfully, but as if with a last scruple for himself.
“There’s nothing left…of the horror?” she asked below her breath.
“To be without you—that’s the only horror!”
“You’re
“Sure!”
“It’s just the same to you…just as it was…before?”
“Just the same, Justine!”
“It’s not for myself, but you.”
“Then, for me—never speak of it!” he implored.
“Because it’s
“Because it’s wiped out—because it’s never been!”
“Never?”
“Never!”
He felt her yield to him at that, and under his eyes, close under his lips, was her face at last. But as they kissed they heard the handle of the door turn, and drew apart quickly, her hand lingering in his under the fold of her dress.
A nurse looked in, dressed in the white uniform and pointed cap of the hospital. Amherst fancied that she smiled a little as she saw them.
“Miss Brent—the doctor wants you to come right up and give the morphine.”
The door shut again as Justine rose to her feet. Amherst remained seated—he had made no motion to retain
