Page:Neith Boyce--The bond.djvu/229

Rh table and splashed two blue streaks across the face and neck in the portrait.

Isabel burst into tears. She went waveringly toward the divan, sank down on it, and wept hysterically into a cushion. Basil, with his back to her, stood silent, passionately resentful; his fingers, clenched in the pocket of his coat, crushed a handful of cigarettes to fragments. When Isabel, finding that she was not to be consoled, stopped crying and summoned the remnants of her pride, it was still some time before she could speak. Basil was still immobile, and there was no sign of softening in his attitude. Isabel, as quickly as possible, took the course which her instinct pointed out as the necessary one. The silence had become terrible to her.

"I was wrong," she said dully. "I have been, I am, wrong. I cannot get what I have wanted. And it is not your fault. I was wrong when I said you had been unkind to me. Perhaps you might have been kinder—perhaps—but I think you have done your best. You aren't exactly a kind person. One must—just make up one's mind to the—bitterness of it. One must see—one's own folly. I have seen it—oh, I have so tried not to see it. I couldn't bear to see it. Now I shan't try any more. I shall—accept it." Her head sank. She smoothed the folds of her dress over her knees with a slow motion. Basil turned toward her a tired, tormented look.