There was something absurd mingled with the horror--as though one
watched the prank of a demon.
Her sensuous nature was tormented by the thought of the last moment. Had
he had time to feel despair--the thirst for life? She prayed not. She
thought of the Sunday afternoon at Grosville Park when they had tried to
play billiards, and Lord Grosville had come down on them; or she saw him
sitting opposite to her, at supper, on the night of the fancy ball, in
the splendid Titian dress, while she gloated over the thoughts of the
trick she had played on Mary Lyster--or bending over her when she woke
from her swoon at Verona. Had she ever really loved him for one
hour?--and if not, what possible excuse, before gods or men, was there
for this ugly, self-woven tragedy into which she had brought herself and
him, merely because her vanity could not bear that William had not been
able to love her, for long, far above all her deserts?
William! Her heart leaped in her breast. He was thirty-six--and she not
twenty-four. A strange and desolate wonder overtook her as the thought
seized her of the years they might still spend on the same
earth--members of the same country, breathing the same air--and yet
forever separate.
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