I came back after a week’s absence to my home again—a changed man. I
had lived out my first rush of passion for Effie, had come to a
contemplation of my position. I had gauged Effie’s place in the scheme
of things, and parted from her for a time. She was back in her place at
Raggett Street after a temporary indisposition. I did not feel in any
way penitent or ashamed, I know, as I opened the little cast-iron gate
that kept Marion’s front grader and Pampas Grass from the wandering
dog. Indeed, if anything, I felt as if I had vindicated some right that
had been in question. I came back to Marion with no sense of
wrong-doing at all with, indeed, a new friendliness towards her. I
don’t know how it may be proper to feel on such occasions; that is how
I felt.
I followed her in our drawing-room, standing beside the tall lamp-stand
that half filled the bay as though she had just turned from watching
for me at the window. There was something in her pale face that
arrested me. She looked as if she had not been sleeping. She did not
come forward to greet me.
“You’ve come home,” she said.
“As I wrote to you.”
She stood very still, a dusky figure against the bright window.
“Where have you been?” she asked.
“East Coast,” I said easily.
She paused for a moment. “I _know_,” she said.