"Some perversity has seized you," he said. The muscles about his mouth
quivered, giving him a curious aspect. "You mean nothing of what you
say."
"Do you believe that?"
"I--I cannot think anything else. It is the only way I can--I can--make
excuse."
"Ah, don't excuse me!" she murmured, with an astonishing little gay
petulance.
"You cannot have thought"--in spite of himself he made a step toward the
door.
"Oh, I did think--I do think. And you must not go." She, too, stood up
and stayed him. "Let us at least see clearly." There was a persuading
note in her voice; one would have thought, indeed, that she was dealing
with a patient, or a child. "Tell me," she clasped her hands behind her
back and looked at him in marvellous, simple candour, "do I really
announce this to you? Was there not in yourself anywhere--deep down--any
knowledge of it?"
"I did not guess--I did not dream!"
"And--now?" she asked.
A heavenly current drifted from her, the words rose and fell on it with
the most dazing suggestion in their soft hesitancy. It must have been by
an instinct of her art that her hand went up to the cross on Arnold's
breast and closed over it, so that he should see only her.
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