etween the shrouded window-curtains showed her crumpled
travelling dress and the white face under her disordered hair.

She found her voice, and asked him how he had been able to leave London.
He answered that he had managed--he'd arranged it; and she saw he hardly
heard what she was saying.

"I had to see you," he went on, and moved nearer, sitting down at her
side.

"Yes; we must think of Owen----"

"Oh, Owen--!"

Her mind had flown back to Sophy Viner's plea that she should let Darrow
return to Givre in order that Owen might be persuaded of the folly of
his suspicions. The suggestion was absurd, of course. She could not ask
Darrow to lend himself to such a fraud, even had she had the inhuman
courage to play her part in it. She was suddenly overwhelmed by the
futility of every attempt to reconstruct her ruined world. No, it was
useless; and since it was useless, every moment with Darrow was pure
pain...

"I've come to talk of myself, not of Owen," she heard him saying.
"When you sent me away the other day I understood that it couldn't be
otherwise--then. But it's not possible that you and I should part like
that. If I'm to lose you, it must be for a better reason."

"A better reason?"

"Yes: a deeper one. One that means a fundamental disaccord between us.
This one doesn't--in spite of everything it doesn't. That's what I want
you to see, and have the courage to acknowledge."

"If I saw it I should have the courage!"

"Yes: courage was the wrong word. You have that. That's why I'm here."

"But I don't see it," she continued sadly. "So it's useless, isn't
it?--and so cruel..." He was about to speak, but she went on: "I shall
never understand it--never!"

He looked at her. "You will some day: you were made to feel everything"

"I should have thought this was a case of not feeling----"

"On my part, you mean?" He faced her resolutely. "Yes, it was: to my
shame...What I meant was that when you've lived a little longer
you'll see what complex blunderers we all are: how we're struck blind
sometimes, and mad sometimes--and then, when our sight and our senses
come back, how we have to set to work, and build up, little by little,
bit by bit, the precious things we'd smashed to atoms without knowing
it. Life's just a perpetual piecing together of broken bits."

She looked up quickly. "That's what I feel: that you ought to----"

He stood up, interrupting her with a gesture. "Oh, don't--don't say what
you're go