"Surely," she said, and her voice shook in spite of her utmost effort to
control it--"surely you must see that you are asking of me more than I
can possibly give. I own that I am--nominally--your wife, but I realize
now that I can never be anything more to you than that. I cannot go away
with you. I can never make my home with you. I married you upon impulse.
I did you a great wrong, but you will admit that you hurried me into it.
And now that--that my eyes are open, I find that I cannot go on. Would
it--would it--" She was faltering under that unchanging gaze, but she
compelled herself to utter the question--"be quite impossible to--to get
a separation?"
"Quite," said Piet.
He did not raise his voice, but she shrank at the brief word, shrank
uncontrollably as if he had struck her.
He went on quite steadily, but his eyes gave her no rest. They seemed to
her to gleam red in the glancing firelight.
"I do not admit that our marriage was a mistake. I was always aware that
you married me for my money. But on the other hand I was willing to pay
your price. I wanted you. And--I want you still. Nothing will alter that
fact. I am sorry if you think you have made a bad bargain, for you will
have to abide by it. Perhaps some day you will change your mind again.
But it is not my habit to change mine. That is, I think, all that need be
said upon the subject.
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