Part 56 (1/2)

Justine followed him, scarcely conscious where she went, but moving already with a lighter tread. Part of her weight of misery had been lifted with Wyant's going. She had suffered less from the fear of what her husband might think than from the shame of making her avowal in her defamer's presence. And her faith in Amherst's comprehension had begun to revive. He had dismissed Wyant with scorn and horror--did not that show that he was on her side already? And how many more arguments she had at her call! Her brain hummed with them as she followed him up the stairs.

In her bedroom he closed the door and stood motionless, the same heavy half-paralyzed look on his face. It frightened her and she went up to him.

”John!” she said timidly.

He put his hand to his head. ”Wait a moment----” he returned; and she waited, her heart slowly sinking again.

The moment over, he seemed to recover his power of movement. He crossed the room and threw himself into the armchair near the hearth.

”Now tell me everything.”

He sat thrown back, his eyes fixed on the fire, and the vertical lines between his brows forming a deep scar in his white face.

Justine moved nearer, and touched his arm beseechingly. ”Won't you look at me?”

He turned his head slowly, as if with an effort, and his eyes rested reluctantly on hers.

”Oh, not like that!” she exclaimed.

He seemed to make a stronger effort at self-control. ”Please don't heed me--but say what there is to say,” he said in a level voice, his gaze on the fire.

She stood before him, her arms hanging down, her clasped fingers twisting restlessly.

”I don't know that there is much to say--beyond what I've told you.”

There was a slight sound in Amherst's throat, like the ghost of a derisive laugh. After another interval he said: ”I wish to hear exactly what happened.”

She seated herself on the edge of a chair near by, bending forward, with hands interlocked and arms extended on her knees--every line reaching out to him, as though her whole slight body were an arrow winged with pleadings. It was a relief to speak at last, even face to face with the stony image that sat in her husband's place; and she told her story, detail by detail, omitting nothing, exaggerating nothing, speaking slowly, clearly, with precision, aware that the bare facts were her strongest argument.

Amherst, as he listened, s.h.i.+fted his position once, raising his hand so that it screened his face; and in that att.i.tude he remained when she had ended.

As she waited for him to speak, Justine realized that her heart had been alive with tremulous hopes. All through her narrative she had counted on a murmur of perception, an exclamation of pity: she had felt sure of melting the stony image. But Amherst said no word.

At length he spoke, still without turning his head. ”You have not told me why you kept this from me.”

A sob formed in her throat, and she had to wait to steady her voice.

”No--that was my wrong--my weakness. When I did it I never thought of being afraid to tell you--I had talked it over with you in my own mind...so often...before....”

”Well?”

”Then--- when you came back it was harder...though I was still sure you would approve me.”

”Why harder?”

”Because at first--at Lynbrook--I _could not_ tell it all over, in detail, as I have now...it was beyond human power...and without doing so, I couldn't make it all clear to you...and so should only have added to your pain. If you had been there you would have done as I did.... I felt sure of that from the first. But coming afterward, you couldn't judge...no one who was not there could judge...and I wanted to spare you....”

”And afterward?”

She had shrunk in advance from this question, and she could not answer it at once. To gain time she echoed it. ”Afterward?”