I think I'd
like you to read it. It would be best." Mariana took the letter, and
followed its irregular course. "It's true enough," she said quietly, at
the end. "But I don't in the least mind, Jim. She had a perfect right to
something of the sort. That is--I'm not annoyed about what she says of
me, but it will upset you terribly. And it has been my fault, from the
first." He protested vehemently, but she stopped him with a gesture;
then walked to the door opening on the porch; where, her head up, she
stood gazing out into the serene, failing light.
James Polder followed her, and Howat heard the screen softly close. He
was about to light a cigarette, but, his hand shaking, he laid it on the
table. He put up his glass, without purpose, and then let it drop.
Rudolph was placing the silver for dinner; old forks faintly marked with
a crest that Isabel Howat had brought to her husband. A recurrence of
the afternoon's sense of the continuity of all living flowed over him,
whispering with old voices, old longing and sorrow and regret, mingled
dim features, and the broken clasping of hands. He saw Mariana sweeping
in a pale current--a remote, eternal passion winding through the
transient body of life. She smiled, her subdued, mocking gaiety
infinitely appealing, and vanished.
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