f he were only conscious of his own
will, not in the least of her and her wanting him.

Later in the day he went out sketching.

"You," he said to her, "go with your mother to Sutton. I am so dull."

She stood and looked at him. He knew she wanted to come with him, but he
preferred to be alone. She made him feel imprisoned when she was there,
as if he could not get a free deep breath, as if there were something on
top of him. She felt his desire to be free of her.

In the evening he came back to her. They walked down the shore in the
darkness, then sat for a while in the shelter of the sandhills.

"It seems," she said, as they stared over the darkness of the sea, where
no light was to be seen--"it seemed as if you only loved me at night--as
if you didn't love me in the daytime."

He ran the cold sand through his fingers, feeling guilty under the
accusation.

"The night is free to you," he replied. "In the daytime I want to be by
myself."

"But why?" she said. "Why, even now, when we are on this short holiday?"

"I don't know. Love-making stifles me in the daytime."

"But it needn't be always love-making," she said.

"It always is," he answered, "when you and I are together."

She sat feeling very bitter.

"Do you ever want to marry me?" he asked curiously.

"Do you me?" she replied.

"Yes, yes; I should like us to have children," he answered slowly.

She sat with her head bent, fingering the sand.

"But you don't really want a divorce from Baxter, do you?" he said.

It was some minutes before she replied.

"No," she said, very deliberately; "I don't think I do."

"Why?"

"I don't know."

"Do you feel as if you belonged to him?"

"No; I don't think so."

"What, then?"

"I think he belongs to me," she replied.

He was silent for some minutes, listening to the wind blowing over the
hoarse, dark sea.

"And you never really intended to belong to ME?" he said.

"Yes, I do belong to you," she answered.

"No," he said; "because you don't want to be divorced."

It was a knot they could not untie, so they left it, took what they
could get, and what they could not attain they ignored.

"I consider you treated Baxter rottenly," he said another time.

He half-expected Clara to answer him, as his mother would: "You consider
your own affairs, and don't know so much about other people's." But she
took him seriously, almost to his own surprise.

"Why?" she said.

"I suppose you thought he was