'"
There was a silence. In it he looked at her hard, mercilessly. She
returned his gaze, still smiling.
"And it is your own fault," he went on after a moment. "If you had been
yourself she couldn't have insulted you first and humiliated you
afterwards. Oh, how I hate it! And yet--yet there are moments when I am
like the others, when I feel--'She has deserved it.'"
"When will you be in Rome?" she said.
"And even now," he continued, ignoring her remark, "even now, what are
you doing? Oh, Viola, you're a prey to the modern madness for crawling in
the dirt instead of walking upright in the sun. You might be a goddess
and you prefer to be an insect. Isn't it mad of you? Isn't it?"
He was really excited, really passionate. His face showed that. There was
fire in his eyes. His lips worked convulsively when he was not speaking.
And yet there was just a faint ring of the accomplished orator's music in
his voice, a music which suggests a listening ear--and that ear the
orator's own.
Perhaps she heard it. At any rate his passionate attack did not seem to
move her.
"I prefer to be what I am," was all she said.
"What you are! But you don't know what you are."
"And how can you pretend to know?" she asked. "Is a man more subtle about
a woman than she is about herself?"
He did not answer for a moment. Then he said bluntly:
"Promise me one thing before I go away."
"I don't know. What is it?"
"Promise me not to--not to--"
He hesitated.
Pages:
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205