HOW MATTERS COME TO A CLIMAX; AND HOW TITA TELLS MAURICE MANY THINGS
THAT STING HIM SHARPLY; AND HOW HE LAYS HANDS UPON HER; AND HOW THE
LAST ADIEUX ARE SAID.
"So you have made up your mind," says Maurice, looking at his wife
with a glance as full of coldness as it is of rage. "You see your
way? It is for ever, remember. You decide on leaving me?"
"Why should I stay?" says Tita.
There is evidently no idea of "staying" about her; she is dressed
for a journey, with care--_great_ care--but with all the air of one
who is going away for a long, long time. She is exquisitely dressed;
the soft gray costume, trimmed with costly furs, sets off her bijou
figure to perfection, and her soft, dainty curls show coquettishly
from beneath her fur cap. Her eyes are shining like stars; her lips
have taken a slightly malicious curve; her rounded chin, soft and
white as a baby's, is delicately tilted. She is looking lovely. "Why
should I stay?" Her question seems to beat upon his brain. He could
have answered it, perhaps, had pride permitted him, but pride is a
great tyrant, and rules with an iron rod. And, besides, even if he
had answered, _she_ has a tyrant, too--her own pride. As a fact we
all have these tyrants, and it is surprising how we hug them to our
breasts.
"Why should I stay?" says Tita. "All you wanted from me is gone; now
I go too. You should rejoice. If you have lost in one way you have
gained in another. You will never see me or my money again!"
The bitterness in the young voice, the hatred in the young eyes, is
terrible.
For a full minute Rylton remains silent. The mind is a strange
thing, not to be controlled, full of vagaries, and now, for no
reason whatever, as it seems to him, it has run back to his wedding
morning. Is _this_ the careless, idle, little tomboy who had stood
before the altar--the little girl he had assured himself he could
mould to his will?
"You forget," says he coldly, "that you are married to me. It is not
so simple a matter as you seem to imagine for a wife to throw off
her marriage yoke."
"Yoke! What a good word that is!" says Tita, with the air of one
making a discovery. Then lightly, "Pouf! Nonsense! I'll show you how
easy it is! And as for that----" Again her mood changes. "Don't go
in for that sort of thing," says she contemptuously. "Be honest with
me now, at the last. You know you will be as glad to get rid of me,
as I shall be to be rid of you."
"Speak for yourself," says Rylton slowly. His eyes are on the
ground. "I have not said I shall be glad to get rid of you."
"No, I have said it for you. I have befriended you to the very end;
and if you _will_ be a hypocrite, why--_be it!"_ cries she gaily.
She throws up her hands with an airy little gesture, full of grace,
and anger, and something else difficult to describe, but that
certainly is devoid of any sort of mirth.
"Hypocrite or not, remember this," says Maurice, "it is _you_ who
have decided on a separation."
"Yes; I--I." She bursts out laughing. "'Alone I did it!' To-day I
set you free!"
"Free!"
"Ah, not so free as I _would_ make you!" shaking her head.
He looks at her.
_ "You_ are honest, at all events," says he bitterly; then, after a
moment, "You approve, then, on the step you are taking?"
Tita makes a gesture of impatience.
"What _will_ you have?" says she. "What do you find fault with now?
Have I not behaved well? Have I not behaved beautifully? I stayed
with you as long as I had any money--the money for which you gave me
your--title. I cannot flatter myself that you gave me more than that
for it. Probably you gave me too much. And so now, when the money is
gone, the bargain is off, and"--with a shrug of her shoulders, and
the saucy glance of a naughty child from under her long lashes--_"I_
am off too! Isn't that being good?"
"Have you no charity?" says he. A dark red flush has crimsoned his
forehead. "What a character you give me! Do you think I have no
heart?"
"Oh, _your_ heart!" says she gaily. "I don't think you need to be
unhappy about it. It will do. You say I am honest, and one thing
honestly I do regret, that I should have unwittingly tempted you to
marry me because of my money--when now it has all dropped overboard.
If I had only known how you regarded it, I----"
"That infernal money!" says he violently.
There is almost a groan in his voice. His eyes are fixed upon her;
he is wondering at her. What a child she looks in her pretty frock!
What an unreasonable child! But what a charm in the angry eyes of
her, the defiance of her whole air! There is something that maddens
him in the scornful shrug of her dainty shoulders.
"Oh yes--yes--of course!" says she, bringing the little disdainful
shrug into full requisition now. "No wonder you abuse it, poor
thing! _But_ for that 'infernal money,' you would never have dreamed
of marrying me, and now that it is gone--gone----" She pauses. "Oh,"
sharply, "I am _glad_ it is gone! It opens for me a way to leave
you!"
Rylton strides forward, and seizes her by both her arms.
"Supposing I don't _let_ you go!" says he.
"I shan't ask your permission," returns she calmly, submitting to
his violent pressure without a wince--a pressure unmeant--unknown by
him, to do him justice. "And I need not! Think of the detestable
life we have lived together! Don't I know that you hated it as much
as I did--perhaps more! No," softly. "Not _more!"_
Rylton loosens his hold of her, and steps back. If she had said a
thousand words, they could not have brought her meaning more
forcibly home to him than these two, "Not _more."_
"Oh, think!" cries she, clasping her hands in a sort of ecstasy.
"To-day--this very day--in an hour or so, we shall be miles, and
miles, and _miles_ away from each other! What more can you desire?"
Rylton brings his hand down upon the table before him.
"Nothing!" returns he hoarsely. "I would rather die than subject
myself to the misery I have been enduring with you. I would, by
heaven!"
"Ah, you speak the truth at last," says she. "Well"--she moves
towards him and holds out her hand--"now that you have spoken, I am
satisfied. Good-bye; I hope I shall never see you again!"
He thrusts her hand aside.
"I shall remember that," says he.
"That was why I said it," returns she. She has flung up her head,
angered a little perhaps even in this desperate moment at his
rejection of her hand. Her eyes are gleaming. Her beauty seems to
shine out--to grow upon him. Maurice regards her curiously even
now--now, when she is going for ever. _How_ can so bitter a spirit
dwell in so sweet a temple? "Will you not say good-bye, then?" says
she.
"No--never."
She turns away deliberately and leaves the room.