"You mustn't come here again," he said, without force, without
feeling of any sort.
She leant back against the pillow, holding a breath in her throat,
and her eyes wandered like a child that is frightened around the room,
passing his face and passing it again, yet fearing to rest upon it
for any appreciable moment of time.
When she found that he was going to say no more, she asked him why.
Just the one word, breathed rather than spoken, no complaint, no
rebellion, the pitiable simplicity of the question that the man puts
to his Fate, the woman to her Maker.
"Why?"
He at least was holding himself in harness that she knew nothing
of--the curb and snaffle, with the reins held tightly across fingers
of iron.
"Why?" he repeated. "If you don't know human nature, would it be wise,
do you think, for me to spell it out to you?"
She knit her brows, trying to see, trying to think, but finding
nothing save the blank and gaping question. Through her mind it swept,
that her fainting was some cause of it. She could not really believe
that that could have brought so much abhorrence to his mind; yet she
tried it. To say anything, to propose any cause, she struggled for
that in order to know the why.
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