Then she had understood! She had seen the gulf between them. She would help him to bridge it.
He hastened to her joyfully, and caught her up in a great embrace, so that she laughed in delicious terror.
And the torment began again. She had seen, understood, nothing. She was only for teasing, wheedling, cajoling him into submission. She told him--carefully choosing her moment--that she would bear him children, and for a little while, a second or two, he was appeased. Then his excited imagination worked on that. A child would mean only another entity in the house, the empty house, where there was no love to absorb it and foster its growth; more antagonism; more separation; his child or hers, it would not be both. He could not see at all clearly, but the idea of it had for him now something horrible. With no count of his words he said:
"I do not wish for anything that you yourself do not want."
"Talk of us, woman, talk of us. God! You don't know how you spoil things with your busy mind. True things, simple things, lovely things, things that lie deep in heart and mind, there is nothing that you will not shape and mold and knead and twist into your own image, pretty, pretty, charming. Oh, the lies of it all, the lies, the lies, the lies! And you never know what you are doing. All is for your pleasure. Nothing can lead you beyond that. And everything that menaces your pleasure you draw with your busy brain into words, words."
He looked up at her with his eyes glazed and dull, his jaw trembling, his fingers rubbing over and over again upon his thumbs.
"If you have said what is true, then you must hate me."
He stated it as though it were a plain fact well coated over by habit, so that it could give no pain. She was tranquil, seemed to have tight control over herself. She walked twice up and down the room. Then she turned to him and said very quietly:
"I knew a long time ago that if it ever came to a scene it would be the end. I suppose I'm not romantic enough for you. I don't know what it is. But I know enough to feel that a scene with you would be serious. Even little girls know that men must have scenes. It's a kind of love-making with them. You're different."
"I can't pretend that you haven't hurt me."