第41章

She clasped her hands tight, with the old gesture he remembered when she was struggling for self-control, and waited a moment.

Presently she began to speak in a low, hurried tone: "It began before you came. I know now what the feeling was that I was afraid to acknowledge to myself. I used to try and smother it; I used to repeat things to myself all day--poems, stupid rhymes--/anything/ to keep my thoughts quite underneath--but I--/hated/ John before you came! We had been married nearly a year then. I never loved him. Of course you are going to say, 'Why did you marry him?' " She looked drearily over the placid sea. "Why /did/ I marry him? I don't know; for the reason that hundreds of ignorant, inexperienced girls marry, I suppose. My home wasn't a happy one. I was miserable, and oh--/restless/. I wonder if men know what it feels like to be restless? Sometimes I think they can't even guess. John wanted me very badly; nobody wanted me at home particularly. There didn't seem to be any point in my life. Do you understand? . . . Of course, being alone with him in that little camp in that silent plain"--she shuddered--"made things worse. My nerves went all to pieces. Everything he said, his voice, his accent, his walk, the way he ate, irritated me so that I longed to rush out sometimes and shriek--and go /mad/. Does it sound ridiculous to you to be driven mad by such trifles? I only know I used to get up from the table sometimes and walk up and down outside, with both hands over my mouth to keep myself quiet. And all the time I /hated/ myself--how I hated myself! I never had a word from him that wasn't gentle and tender. I believe he loved the ground I walked on. Oh, it is /awful/ to be loved like that when you--" She drew in her breath with a sob.

"I--I--it made me sick for him to come near me--to touch me." She stopped a moment.

Broomhurst gently laid his hand on her quivering one. "Poor little girl!" he murmured.

"Then /you/ came," she said, "and before long I had another feeling to fight against. At first I thought it couldn't be true that I loved you --it would die down. I think I was /frightened/ at the feeling; I didn't know it hurt so to love any one."

Broomhurst stirred a little. "Go on," he said, tersely.

"But it didn't die," she continued, in a trembling whisper, "and the other /awful/ feeling grew stronger and stronger--hatred; no, that is not the word--/loathing/ for--for--John. I fought against it. Yes," she cried, feverishly, clasping and unclasping her hands; "Heaven knows I fought it with all my strength, and reasoned with myself, and --oh, I did /everything/, but--" Her quick-falling tears made speech difficult.

"Kathleen!" Broomhurst urged, desperately, "you couldn't help it, you poor child. You say yourself you struggled against your feelings. You were always gentle; perhaps he didn't know."

"But he did--he /did/," she wailed; "it is just that. I hurt him a hundred times a day; he never said so, but I knew it; and yet I /couldn't/ be kind to him,--except in words,--and he understood. And after you came it was worse in one way, for he knew--I /felt/ he knew --that I loved you. His eyes used to follow me like a dog's, and I was stabbed with remorse, and I tried to be good to him, but I couldn't."

"But--he didn't suspect--he trusted you," began Broomhurst. "He had every reason. No woman was ever so loyal, so--"

"Hush!" she almost screamed. "Loyal! it was the least I could do--to stop you, I mean--when you--After all, I knew it without your telling me. I had deliberately married him without loving him. It was my own fault. I felt it. Even if I couldn't prevent his knowing that I hated him, I could prevent /that/. It was my punishment. I deserved it for /daring/ to marry without love. But I didn't spare John one pang after all," she added, bitterly. "He knew what I felt toward him; I don't think he cared about anything else. You say I mustn't reproach myself?

When I went back to the tent that morning--when you--when I stopped you from saying you loved me, he was sitting at the table with his head buried in his hands; he was crying--bitterly. I saw him,--it is terrible to see a man cry,--and I stole away gently, but he saw me. I was torn to pieces, but I /couldn't/ go to him. I knew he would kiss me, and I shuddered to think of it. It seemed more than ever not to be borne that he should do that--when I knew /you/ loved me."

"Kathleen," cried her lover, again, "don't dwell on it all so terribly --don't--"