erself with all her quivering
strength to speak quietly. "I do not wish to be your wife. I have
realized for some time that my marriage was a mistake, and I thought
it possible, I hoped with all my heart, that you would see it, too. I
suppose, by your coming back in this way, that you have not yet done so?"

He was standing very quietly before her with his hands behind him.
Notwithstanding her wild misgiving, she could not see that he was in any
way angered by her words. He seemed to observe her with a grave interest.
That was all.

A tremor of passion went through her. His passivity was not to be borne.
In some curious fashion it hurt her. She felt as though she were beating
and bruising herself against bars of iron.

"Surely," she said, and her voice shook in spite of her utmost effort to
control it--"surely you must see that you are asking of me more than I
can possibly give. I own that I am--nominally--your wife, but I realize
now that I can never be anything more to you than that. I cannot go away
with you. I can never make my home with you. I married you upon impulse.
I did you a great wrong, but you will admit that you hurried me into it.
And now that--that my eyes are open, I find that I cannot go on. Would
it--would it--" She was faltering under that unchanging gaze, but she
compelled herself to utter the question--"be quite impossible to--to get
a separation?"

"Quite," said Piet.

He did not raise his voice, but she shrank at the brief word, shrank
uncontrollably as if he had struck her.

He went on quite steadily, but his eyes gave her no rest. They seemed to
her to gleam red in the glancing firelight.

"I do not admit that our marriage was a mistake. I was always aware that
you married me for my money. But on the other hand I was willing to pay
your price. I wanted you. And--I want you still. Nothing will alter that
fact. I am sorry if you think you have made a bad bargain, for you will
have to abide by it. Perhaps some day you will change your mind again.
But it is not my habit to change mine. That is, I think, all that need be
said upon the subject."

There was not the faintest hint of vehemence in his tone, but there was
unmistakable authority. Having spoken, he stood grimly waiting for her
next move.

As for Nan, a sudden fury entered into her that possessed her more
completely than any fear. To be thus mastered in a few curt sentences was
more than her wild spirit would endure. Without an in