When she came to herself again a sudden gloom pervaded the place. Large drops of rain splashed on the window-sill. She watched them idly a moment, then her eyes wandered to the other window where Mirko stood leaning, pulling at his moustache, then down to herself. Suddenly a gulf of realization and shame overwhelmed her. With a hasty hand she straightened out her skirts, then flung herself down, sobbing, her burning face hidden in the cushion.
At the sound Mirko turned and came towards her, an exceedingly sheepish expression on his handsome face.
"Don't, love!" he said, putting his hand on her shoulder. She writhed away from him.
"Don't, dear," he repeated awkwardly, and as the girl paid no attention, he knelt at her side and kissed all that was visible of one ear. She sat up, wild-eyed and disheveled.
"Oh, how could you?" she sobbed, "oh, why did you do it? Oh, how can I ever look anyone in the face again!"
She flung herself down again, her voice lost in a paroxysm of grief.
Mirko bit his moustache; scenes of this kind annoyed him terribly and now that his fever had passed he could think of nothing to say. Presently Ragna faced him once more.
"Never! Never in the world, my darling!" he cried but his voice carried no conviction. "I owe you all gratitude!"
"Oh!" she said, her eyes widening, a hard look coming over her face, "oh!"
"I am your devoted slave,--you have given me the greatest proof of love--"
"What are you going to do about it?" she interrupted.
"Do about it. What is there to do? The memory of this--"
"Ah, so it is already a memory to you! To me it is dishonour."
"My dear child, nothing of the sort! We loved each other, we lost our heads,--there is no dishonour, no one need know."
His ineffectual manner struck her like a blow. Covering her face with her hands she burst into fresh sobs.
Mirko like all men, hated above all things a scene; he began to feel angry, revengeful even, the more so as his conscience reproached him. He said in a hard voice:
"Look here, Ragna, you are not a fool, you knew I could not marry you--"
Her scornful eyes stopped him; he shrugged his shoulders.
"My dear girl, if you had not wished--I have never taken a woman against her will--"
He rose and strolling to the window carefully chose a cigarette from his case and as carefully lit it, but in spite of himself his hands trembled. Ragna sat immovable on the sofa as though turned to stone. The rain pattered softly on the window-sill and the warm heavy dampness invaded the room. Below, in the kitchen, someone was clattering pots and pans, and Maria's voice took up the refrain of the "Ciociara." The lively tune rose, a ghastly mockery, and Ragna smiled at the irony of it, then a fresh wave of despair swept over her, her shaken nerves gave way, and dropping her head on her folded hands she wept disconsolately and brokenly. The forlornness of her attitude, the bowed head with its dishevelled mass of golden hair, the slender shoulders heaving with noiseless sobs touched Mirko; he threw his cigarette out of the window with an angry gesture and paced up and down the long narrow room, tugging at his moustache and knitting his brows. The mood of brutality like that of a sated animal had passed and a reaction of something very like shame, set in--shame be it said, not for having taken advantage of a confiding girl, but for the unchivalrous cynicism of his subsequent conduct which he could see no way of glossing over. A woman may forgive passion, brutality even, but not the poisoned barb of cynicism. His vanity refused to consider the situation irretrievable notwithstanding, and he paused beside the weeping girl.