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Rh would like to give back now. . . in so far as was possible to her!

"Henri," she repeated, for her whole thought had rushed through her in those two or three seconds, "there is something more I want to say to you. I should like to talk frankly to you. Promise me to keep calm; and do not let us lose our tempers. It is not necessary to lose our tempers, Henri, in order to understand each other at last . . ."

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"I have been thinking a great deal lately," she continued, turning her steady eyes towards him. "I have been thinking a very great deal, about our life, about both our lives . . . and about the mistake we made . . ."

He became impatient:

"What on earth are you driving at and what is it all about?" he asked, with an irritable shake of his shoulders.

"Come, Henri," she said, gently, "let us talk for once, for once in our lives, and be quite frank and serious. Our life has been a mistake. And the fault . . ."

"Is mine, I suppose?" he broke in, angrily, aggressively, working himself up for the scene which he foresaw.

She looked at him long and deeply and then said, firmly:

"The fault is mine."