'She said that, did she? Cursed old witch. Well, her lies are always half truths, I expect. I should have been Marthe's lover now, Jill, if she would have taken me.'
Jill was leaning away from him, with shut eyes, but fiercely, almost savagely, while he put his truths before her, he held her still and made her see it all; all that she had lost; yet all she gained in the strange triumph of such sincerity.
'Which would you rather, Jill; give me up; let me go;—or have us lovers? The truth, the real truth, that she sees as clearly as I do—more clearly—is that you are my wife and she and I lovers. It's because it's the truth that I feel I may make her accept it. I could never make her accept your place.'
'But I haven't got any place.' Jill freed herself at last, and his hands fell from her as he saw that there was no more for him to say. 'I'm your friend. But I'm not your wife. That's the truth you must make her see. She sees the other because she's French. But I'm English. I'm not a wife if my husband loves somebody else more than he loves me. Oh, I'm not unkind, Dick;—you know I'm not. It's only truth. And how could I bear it, for Marthe, that she should be your mistress? That you should love her—and leave her? I couldn't bear it. I must go. To-day. When she hears that I have gone, she will see what it means to me. She'll see that to myself I'm not a wife any longer. A wife must be everything. She must be home;—but she must be heaven, too.'
Graham stood near the window, where she had left
