"What!" John forgot to whisper. It was the greatest shock his recluse
life had known, compact as it was of horror at the revelation, shamed
confusion at her candour, and delicious pleasure in her confidence.
This fragile, exquisite creature under the rod of a brutal bully!
Once he had gone to a wedding reception, and among the serious
presents some grinning Philistine drew his attention to an uncouth
club--"a wife-beater" he called it. The flippancy had jarred upon
John terribly: this intrusive reminder of the customs of the slums. It
grated like Billingsgate in a boudoir. Now that savage weapon recurred
to him--for a lurid instant he saw Winifred's husband wielding it.
Oh, abomination of his sex! And did he stand there, in his immaculate
evening dress, posing as an English gentleman? Even so might some
gentleman burglar bear through a salon his imperturbable swallow-tail.
Beat a woman! Beat that essence of charm and purity, God's best gift
to man, redeeming him from his own grossness! Could such things
be? John Lefolle would as soon have credited the French legend that
English wives are sold in Smithfield. No! it could not be real that
this flower-like figure was thrashed.
"Do you mean to say--?" he cried. The rapidity of her confidence alone
made him feel it all of a dreamlike unreality.
"Hush! Cecilia's singing!" she admonished him with an unexpected
smile, as her fingers fell from her face.
"Oh, you have been making fun of me." He was vastly relieved. "He
beats you--at chess--or at lawn-tennis?"
"Does one wear a high-necked dress to conceal the traces of chess, or
lawn-tennis?"
He had not noticed her dress before, save for its spiritual whiteness.
Susceptible though he was to beautiful shoulders, Winifred's
enchanting face had been sufficiently distracting. Now the thought
of physical bruises gave him a second spasm of righteous horror. That
delicate rose-leaf flesh abraded and lacerated!
"The ruffian! Does he use a stick or a fist?"
"Both! But as a rule he just takes me by the arms and shakes me like a
terrier. I'm all black and blue now."
"Poor butterfly!" he murmured poetically.
"Why did I tell you?" she murmured back with subtler poetry.
The poet thrilled in every vein. "Love at first sight," of which he
had often read and often written, was then a reality! It could be
as mutual, too, as Romeo's and Juliet's. But how awkward that Juliet
should be married and her husband a Bill Sykes in broadcloth!