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472 472 THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY. entered the room found itself caught in a mesh of fine threads. His last words were not a command, they constituted a kind of appeal ; and though she felt that any expression of respect on Osmond's part could only be a refinement of egotism, they represented something transcendent and absolute, like the sign of the cross or the flag of one's country. He spoke in the name of something sacred and precious the observance of a magnificent form. They were as perfectly apart in feeling as two disillusioned lovers had ever been ; but they had never yet separated in act. Isabel had not changed ; her old passion for justice still abode within her ; and now, in the very thick oi her sense of -her husband's blasphemous sophistry, it began to throb to a tune which for a moment promised him the victory. It came over her that in his wish to preserve appear- ances he was after all sincere, and that this, as far as it went, was a merit. Ten minutes before, she had felt all the joy of irreflective action a joy to which she had so long been a stranger ; but action had been suddenly changed to slow renun- ciation, transformed by the blight of her husband's touch. If she must renounce, however, she would let him know that she was a victim rather than a dupe. " I know you are a master of the art of mockery," she said. " How can you speak of an indissoluble union how can you speak of your being contented 1 "Where is our union when you accuse me of falsity 1 Where is your contentment when you have nothing but hideous suspicion in your heart 1 ? " " It is in our living decently together, in spite of such drawbacks." " We don't live decently together ! " Isabel cried. " Indeed we don't, if you go to England." " That's very little; that's nothing. I might do much more." Osmond raised his eyebrows and even his shoulders a little ; he had lived long enough in Italy to catch this trick. " Ah, if you have come to threaten me, I prefer my drawing," he said, walking back to his table, where he took up the sheet of paper on which he had been working and stood a moment examining his work. " I suppose that if I go you will not expect me to come back," said Isabel. He turned quickly round, and she could see that this move- ment at least was not studied. He looked at her a little, and then " Are you out of your mind 1 " he inquired. " How can it be anything but a rupture ? " she went on ; " especially if all you say is true ] " She was unable to see how