“Where shall we dine?” he repeated gaily, and she named a well-known restaurant for which she had once heard him express a preference. But as she did so she fancied she saw a shadow on his face, and instantly she said to herself: “It was there he went with her!”
“Oh, no, not there, after all!” she interrupted herself; and now she was sure his colour deepened.
“Where shall it be, then?”
She noticed that he did not ask the reason of her change, and this convinced her that she had guessed the truth, and that he knew she had guessed it. “He will always know what I am thinking, and he will never dare to ask me,” she thought; and she saw between them the same insurmountable wall of silence as between herself and Owen, a wall of glass through which they could watch each other’s faintest motions but which no sound could ever traverse…
They drove to a restaurant on the Boulevard, and there, in their intimate corner of the serried scene, the sense of what was unspoken between them gradually ceased to oppress her. He looked so light-hearted and handsome, so ingenuously proud of her, so openly happy at being with her, that no other fact could seem real in his presence. He had learned that the Ambassador was to spend two days in Paris, and he had reason to hope that in consequence his own departure for London would be deferred. He was exhilarated by the prospect of being with Anna for a few hours longer, and she did not ask herself if his exhilaration were a sign of insensibility, for she was too conscious of his power of swaying her moods not to be secretly proud of affecting his.
They lingered for some time over the fruit and coffee, and when they rose to go Darrow suggested that, if she felt disposed for the play, they were not too late for the second part of the programme at one of the smaller theatres.
His mention of the hour recalled Owen to her thoughts. She saw his train rushing southward through the storm, and, in a corner of the swaying compartment, his face, white and indistinct as it had loomed on her in the rainy twilight. It was horrible to be thus perpetually paying for her happiness!
Darrow had called for a theatrical journal, and he presently looked up from it to say: “I hear the second play at the Athenee is amusing.”
It was on Anna’s lips to acquiesce; but as she was about to speak she wondered if it were not at the Athenee that Owen had seen Darrow with Sophy Viner. She was not sure he had even mentioned the theatre, but the mere possibility was enough to darken her sky. It was hateful to her to think of accompanying Darrow to places where the girl had been with him. She tried to reason away this scruple, she even reminded herself with a bitter irony that whenever she was in Darrow’s arms she was where the girl had been before her –but she could not shake off her superstitious dread of being with him in any of the scenes of the Parisian episode. She replied that she was too tired for the play, and they drove back to her apartment. At the foot of the stairs she half-turned to wish him good night, but he appeared not to notice her gesture and followed her up to her door.
“This is ever so much better than the theatre,” he said as they entered the drawing-room.
She had crossed the room and was bending over the hearth to light the fire. She knew he was approaching her, and that in a moment he would have drawn the cloak from her shoulders and laid his lips on her neck, just below the gathered-up hair. These privileges were his and, however deferently and tenderly he claimed them, the joyous ease of his manner marked a difference and proclaimed a right.
“After the theatre they came home like this,” she thought; and at the same instant she felt his hands on her shoulders and shrank back.
“Don’t–oh, don’t!” she cried, drawing her cloak about her. She saw from his astonished stare that her face must be quivering with pain.