Nor had I long to wait. Presently she appeared, and
I could have doubted the testimony of my eyes, so changed were
the agonized face and figure of a few moments before. Beautiful
and disdainful, she moved to the table, and took the great chair
drawn before it with the air of an empress mounting a throne. I
contented myself with the stool.
She ate nothing, and scarcely touched the canary I poured for her. I
pressed upon her wine and viands, - in vain; I strove to make
conversation, - equally in vain. Finally, tired of "yes" and "no"
uttered as though she were reluctantly casting pearls before swine,
I desisted, and applied myself to my supper in a silence as sullen as
her own. At last we rose from table, and I went to look to the
fastenings of door and windows, and returning found her standing
in the centre of the room, her head up and her hands clenched at
her sides. I saw that we were to have it out then and there, and I
was glad of it.
"You have something to say," I said. "I am quite at your
command," and I went and leaned against the chimneypiece.
The low fire upon the hearth burnt lower still before she broke the
silence. When she did speak it was slowly, and with a voice which
was evidently controlled only by a strong effort of a strong will.
She said: -
"When - yesterday, to-day, ten thousand years ago you went from
this horrible forest down to that wretched village yonder, to those
huts that make your London, you went to buy you a wife?"
"Yes, madam," I answered.
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