Page:The Other House (London, William Heinemann, 1896), Volume 2.djvu/88

74 against her cheek. His eyes were on their companion. "You said it for Mr. Vidal? He liked it, all the same, better than I," he replied in a moment.

"Of course he liked it! But it doesn't matter what he likes," Rose added. "As for you—I don't know that your 'liking' it was what I wanted."

"What then did you want?"

"That you should see me utterly abased—and all the more utterly that it was in the cruel presence of another."

Dennis had raised his head and sunk back into the angle of the bench, separated from her by such space as it yielded. His face, presented to her over Effie's curls, was a combat of mystifications. "Why in the world should that give me pleasure?"

"Why in the world shouldn't it?" Rose asked. "What's your revenge but pleasure?"

She had got up again in her dire restlessness; she glowed there in the perversity of her sacrifice. If he hadn't come to Wilverley to watch her, his wonder-stricken air much wronged him. He shook his head again with his tired patience. "Oh, damn pleasure!" he exclaimed.