"
Sylvia had never heard such bitter accents issue from human lips before.
"The horse you saw me ride this morning," he went on in a low tone, "is
not my horse; it belongs to my brother-in-law. It is sent for me every
day because my sister loves me, and she thinks my health will suffer if
I do not take exercise. My brother-in-law did not give me the horse,
though he is the most generous of human beings, for he feared that if
he did I should sell it in order that I might have more money for play."
There was a long, painful pause, then in a lighter tone the Count added,
"And now, au revoir, Madame, and forgive me for having thrust my private
affairs on your notice! It is not a thing I have been tempted ever to do
before with one whom I have the honour of knowing as slightly as I know
yourself."
Sylvia went upstairs to her room. She was touched, moved, excited. It was
quite a new experience with her to come so really near to any man's heart
and conscience.
Life is a secret and a tangled skein, full of loose, almost invisible
threads. This curiously intimate, and yet impersonal conversation with
one who was not only a stranger, but also a foreigner, made her realise
how little we men and women really know of one another.
Pages:
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122