Page:Early Autumn (1926).pdf/200

 and looked at Olivia as if she doubted the truth of what she had said.

She did not go downstairs at once. Instead, she went to her own room and after bathing, seated herself in the chaise longue by the open window above the terrace, prepared to read the letters one by one. From below there arose a murmur of voices, one metallic and hard, the other nervous, thin, and high-pitched—Sabine's and Aunt Cassie's—as they sat on the terrace in acid conversation, each trying to outstay the other. Listening, Olivia decided that she was a little weary of them both this morning; it was the first time it had ever occurred to her that in a strange way there was a likeness between two women who seemed so different. That curious pair, who hated each other so heartily, had the same way of trying to pry into her life.

None of the letters bore any dates, so she fell to reading them in the order in which they had been found, beginning with the one which read:

She read on:

It's the thought of his being there beside you, even taking possession of you sometimes, that I can't bear. I see him sitting there in the drawing-room, looking at you—eating you with his eyes and pretending all the while that he is above the lusts of the flesh. The flesh! The flesh! You and I,