case. Society claims the right--and has the power--to harbor things
against us; hence the gallows, the prisons, and decrees of social
banishment. However, this sort of talk was confidential--between her and
me only. If society were disposed to give her the benefit of the doubt,
it would be very unlike Jenny not to make the thing as easy as possible
for society. Often society has no objection to being "cheated"; it will
let you shut its eyes to what you have done--strictly on condition that
you do not so much as hint that you had any right to do it. But it was
doubtful whether Jenny would find all Catsford in this accommodating
temper.

"What's your opinion?" she asked abruptly.

"If I understand you rightly, you did a serious thing; on any theory and
to anybody who thinks--never mind his precise views--a very serious
thing. But you seem to know that well enough, and more talk about it
won't mend matters."

"It was a wonderful time--my time of defiance--my time of surrender. At
least I tried to make it surrender--and my greatest surrender was to
consent not to go on defying. While I defied, I could surrender--because
I could lose sight of everything in him. He was big enough, Austin! I
seemed then to be putting the world--both worlds, if you like--quite out
of sight, annihilating them for myself, saying I could get on without
them if only I had Leonard--or, rather, if only Leonard would--would
swallow me up!" She looked at me with one of her straight candid
glances. "Well, he had no objection to that." Her lips curved in a
reluctant smile. "You wouldn't expect him to have, would you? We made a
plan. We were to go to Africa--somewhere in British East Africa--and
live there--away from everything. Not because of fear or anything of
that sort, you know--but because we felt we could get on better there. I
wanted to strip myself of everything that made me distinct from him--of
all I had or was, apart from him. I knew all the time that here, at
home, we should be impossible together; you know I felt that because you
watched the whole thing, Austin, and must have known that only that
feeling could have kept me from him. Well, I could only try to drive out
that fear of him by accepting all it meant--by being quite natural about
it--by saying, 'I've an instinct that you'll absorb me; I yield to
it--only make it easy--give it the best chance--don't keep me where all
sorts of things compel me to struggle against it. Struggling is