His hands
were clenched on his knees. When she looked at him he began to smile.
"Viola," he said, "Viola."
He unclenched his hands and put them out towards her, as if to take her
hands. She did not move.
"Poor Robin!" she said.
"Poor--but--what do you mean?" he stammered.
He never turned his eyes from her face.
"Poor Robin!--but it isn't your fault."
Then she put out her hand and touched his gently.
"My fault?
"That it was all a fancy, all a weaving of words. You want to be what you
thought you were, but you can't be."
"You're wrong, Viola, you're utterly wrong--"
"Hush, Robin! That woman you spoke of--that woman knows."
He cleared his throat, got up, went over to the wall, leaned his arms
upon it and hid his face on them. There were tears in his eyes. At that
moment he was suffering more than she was. His soul was rent by an abject
sense of loss, an abject sense of guilty impotence and shame. It was
frightful that he could not be what he wished to be, what he had thought
he was. He longed to comfort her and could not do anything but plunge a
sword into her heart. He longed to surround her with tenderness--yes, he
was sure he longed--but he could only hold up to her in the sun her
loneliness. And he had lost--what had he not lost? A dream of years, an
imagination that had been his inseparable and dearest companion. His
loneliness was intense in that moment as was hers.
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