Part 25 (1/2)

He motioned her in as he spoke, and shut the door. Katharine walked past him in a half-dazed kind of way. There had been only two feelings expressed in his face, and one was surprise, and the other annoyance.

”What is it, Katharine? Has anything gone wrong?” he demanded in his low, masterful tone. Katharine turned cold; she had never realised before how pitilessly masterful his tone was.

”I couldn't help coming,--I was so miserable! They were all saying things about you, things that were not true. And I wanted to hear you say they were not true. I couldn't rest; so I came. Are you angry with me for coming, Paul?”

She faltered out the words, without looking at him. Paul shrugged his shoulders, but she did not see the movement.

”It was hardly worth while, was it, to risk your reputation merely to confirm what you had already settled in your own mind?”

She opened her eyes, and stared at him hopelessly. Paul walked away to look for some cigarette papers in the pocket of a coat.

”Was it?” he repeated, with his back turned to her. Katharine struggled to answer him.

”You have never spoken to me like that, before,” she stammered at last.

”You have never given me any cause, have you?” said Paul, rather awkwardly.

”But what have I done?” she asked, taking a step towards him. ”I didn't know you would mind. I always come to you when I am unhappy; you told me I might. And I was unhappy this evening; so I came. Why should it be different this evening? I don't understand what you mean.

Why are you angry with me? You have never been angry before. What have I done?”

”My dear child, there is no occasion for heroics,” said Paul, speaking very gently. ”I am not angry with you at all. But you must own that it is at least unusual to call upon a man, uninvited, at this unearthly hour. And hadn't you better sit down, now you have come?”

Katharine did not move.

”What does it matter if it is unusual?” she asked. ”You know I have been here sometimes, as late as this, before. There is no harm in it, is there? Paul! tell me what I have done to annoy you?”

Paul gave up rummaging in his coat pocket, and came and sat on the edge of the table, and made a cigarette.

”I seem to remember having this same argument with you before,” he observed. ”Don't you think it is rather futile to go all through it again? You know quite well that it is entirely for your sake that I wish to be careful. Hadn't we better change the subject? If you are going to stop, you might be more comfortable in a chair.”

Katharine clenched her hands in the effort to keep back her tears.

”I am not going to stay,” she cried, miserably. ”I can't understand why you are so cruel to me; I think it must amuse you to hurt me. Why do you ask me to come and see you sometimes, quite as late as this, and then object to my coming to-night? I don't know what you mean.”

Paul lighted his cigarette before he answered her.

”You have quite a talent, Katharine, for asking uncomfortable questions. If you cannot see the difference between coming when you are asked, and coming uninvited, I am afraid I cannot help you. Would you like any coffee or anything?”

All at once her brain began to clear. For two hours she had been wandering aimlessly through the streets, in a strange bewilderment of mind, not knowing why she was there nor where she was going. Then she had found herself in Fleet Street; and habit, rather than intention, had brought her to the Temple. And now his maddening indifference had touched her pride, and her deadened faculties began slowly to revive under the shock. She put her fingers over her eyes, and tried to think. The blood rushed to her face, and she thrilled all over with a pa.s.sionate instinct of resistance. He did not know what to make of her, when she stepped suddenly in front of him and faced him unflinchingly.

”You must not expect me to see the difference,” she said, proudly. ”I shall never understand why I have to make a secret of what is not wrong, nor why you allow me to do it at all if it is wrong. I think you have been playing with my friends.h.i.+p all the time; I can see now that you have not valued it, because I gave it you so freely. But I didn't know that; I wasn't clever enough; and I had never liked anybody but you. I didn't know that I ought to hide it, and pretend that I didn't like you. Perhaps, if I had done that you would have gone on liking me.”

He was going to interrupt her, but she did not give him time.

”Would you ask Marion Keeley to come and see you, as you have asked me?”

Paul's face grew dark, and she trembled suddenly at her own boldness.

”I fail to see how such a question can interest either of us,” he said, coldly.

”But would you ask her?” she repeated.