hing quite apart,
not touching his love and need of her. If she would only believe that!
Over and over he repeated it; over and over again perceived that she
could not take it in. The only thing she saw was that his love had gone
from her to another--though that was not true! Suddenly she broke out of
his arms, pushing him from her, and cried: "That girl--hateful, horrible,
false!" Never had he seen her look like this, with flaming spots in her
white cheeks, soft lips and chin distorted, blue eyes flaming, breast
heaving, as if each breath were drawn from lungs that received no air.
And then, as quickly, the fire went out of her; she sank down on the
sofa; covering her face with her arms, rocking to and fro. She did not
cry, but a little moan came from her now and then. And each one of those
sounds was to Lennan like the cry of something he was murdering. At last
he went and sat down on the sofa by her and said:

"Sylvia! Sylvia! Don't! oh! don't!" And she was silent, ceasing to
rock herself; letting him smooth and stroke her. But her face she kept
hidden, and only once she spoke, so low that he could hardly hear: "I
can't--I won't keep you from her." And with the awful feeling that no
words could reach or soothe the wound in that tender heart, he could only
go on stroking and kissing her hands.

It was atrocious--horrible--this that he had done! God knew that he had
not sought it--the thing had come on him. Surely even in her misery she
could see that! Deep down beneath his grief and self-hatred, he knew,
what neither she nor anyone else could know--that he could not have
prevented this feeling, which went back to days before he ever saw the
girl--that no man could have stopped that feeling in himself. This
craving and roving was as much part of him as his eyes and hands, as
overwhelming and natural a longing as his hunger for work, or his need of
the peace that Sylvia gave, and alone could give him. That was the
tragedy--it was all sunk and rooted in the very nature of a man. Since
the girl had come into their lives he was no more unfaithful to his wife
in thought than he had been before. If only she could look into him, see
him exactly as he was, as, without part or lot in the process, he had
been made--then she would understand, and even might not suffer; but she
could not, and he could never make it plain. And solemnly, desperately,
with a weary feeling of the futility of words, he went on tryin