Now listen! I am going downstairs and I shall stay there for
exactly half an hour. If between now and the end of that half-hour you
come to me with any good and sufficient reason for letting you go back
and live apart from me in your father's house, I will let you go. You
have asked me to remember that you are my wife. Precisely what you meant
by that you have left me to guess. You will make that request of yours
quite plain to me within the next half-hour."
He relinquished his hold with the words, and would have withdrawn his
hand, but she made a sharp movement to stay him.
"Do you--really--mean that?" she asked him, a catch in her voice, her
head still bent.
"I have said it," he said.
But still with nervous fingers she sought to detain him.
"What--what would you consider a good and sufficient reason?"
The hand she held clenched slowly upon itself.
"If you can convince me," he said, his voice very deep and steady, "that
to desert me would be for your happiness, I will let you go for that."
"But how can I convince you?" she said, her face still hidden from him,
her hands closed tightly upon his wrist.
"You will be able to do so," he said, "if you know your own mind."
"And if--if I fail to satisfy you?" she faltered.
He was silent. After a moment he deliberately freed himself, and turned
away.
"Those are my terms," he said. "If you do not come to me in half an hour
I shall conclude that you leave the decision in my hands--in short, that
you wish to remain my wife.
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