Page:Fidelia, (IA fidelia00balm).pdf/172

 It was an honest, serious, deadly serious question, impossible for him to answer falsely or lightly or to evade.

"Oh, I want to want to," he said.

"You want—" she took another word—"you would like to hold me as you—" again she changed her word—"as we did that night Fidelia came?"

"Not now."

"You want," said Alice's voice and each syllable was deliberate and distinct. She had thought out each word while she lay her hours in the dressing room and now, with each word of this doom, she thought out each again before speaking it, "to be free of me?"

He did not answer and she struck him. Her little clenched fist came down upon his knee. Otherwise they had no contact at all.

"You say it! You've got to say it! You've got to! I never will! Never! Never!"

"Yes," said Dave.

She opened the door beside her; it was the door away from the Hall. She whispered: "You are! You hear me? You hear me?"

"Yes," said Dave.

She was on the ground and, running about the rear of the cab, she disappeared into the Hall.