And talked.
You have to imagine horrible pictures of gloom and half lights,
and emotions running through silent nights--through whole nights.
You have to imagine my beautiful Nancy appearing suddenly to
Edward, rising up at the foot of his bed, with her long hair falling,
like a split cone of shadow, in the glimmer of a night-light that
burned beside him. You have to imagine her, a silent, a no doubt
agonized figure, like a spectre, suddenly offering herself to
him--to save his reason! And you have to imagine his frantic
refusal--and talk. And talk! My God!
And yet, to me, living in the house, enveloped with the charm of
the quiet and ordered living, with the silent, skilled servants
whose mere laying out of my dress clothes was like a caress--to
me who was hourly with them they appeared like tender, ordered
and devoted people, smiling, absenting themselves at the proper
intervals; driving me to meets--just good people! How the
devil--how the devil do they do it?
At dinner one evening Leonora said--she had just opened a
telegram:
"Nancy will be going to India, tomorrow, to be with her father."
No one spoke. Nancy looked at her plate; Edward went on eating
his pheasant.
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