gulf between us. For you, the body is all and everything, but not for
us. We _can_ feel the same desire, perhaps--after you have taught us.
But the thing we long for in our innermost heart--you never give
us. You give us moments of intoxication, no more. And we are foolish
enough to trust you. We are cheated of our due, but we hope on; we
come to you and beg and pray for it, until at last we realise that
you _can_ give us nothing but what in itself, by itself, only fills us
with loathing...."

Olof breathed hard, as in a moment's respite at the stake, with the
lash still threatening above his head.

"Yes, that is your way. You take us--but why will you never take us
wholly? You give us money, or fine clothes, a wedding ring even--but
never yourselves, never the thing we longed for in you from the first.
You look on love as a pastime only; for us, it is life itself. But you
never understand, only wash your hands of it all, and go your own ways
self-satisfied as ever."

Olof was ashy pale and his eyelids quivered nervously.

The woman's face had lost its scornful look, the hardness of her
features had relaxed. She was silent a moment, and when she spoke
again, seemed altogether changed. She spoke softly and gently, with a
tremor in her voice.

"Even you, Olof, even you do not understand. I know what you are
thinking now. You ask, what right have I to reproach you, seeing that
I was never yours as--as the others were? It is true, but for all that
you were more closely bound to me, with a deeper tie, than with the
others. What do I care for them? They do not matter--it is nothing to
me if they ever existed or not. But you and I--we were united, though
perhaps you cannot understand.... Olof! When I sat close to you, in
your arms, I felt that my blood belonged to you, and that feeling I
have never altogether lost. It is you I have been seeking through all
these years--you, and something to still the longing you set to grow
in my soul. Men fondled me with coarse hands, and had their will of
me--and I thought of _your_ caresses; it was with you, with you I
sinned!"

The sweat stood out in beads on Olof's brow--the torture was almost
more than he could bear. "I know, I know!" he would have said. "Say no
more--I know it all!" But he could not frame a single word.

She moved nearer, watching him closely.

And slipping to the floor beside him, she clasped his knees.

"Olof--don't look like that!" she cried. "Don't you se