She was not a woman to whom it was possible to say what one did not believe and I could not pretend that I did not know what she meant.
I remained silent for a second or two.
“Why should you allow yourself to be divorced?”
“Robert Canton is a stuffy old thing.
I very much doubt if he’d let Barbara marry Peter if I divorced him.
And for me, you know, it isn’t of the smallest consequence: one divorce more or less …” She shrugged her pretty shoulders.
“How do you know he wants to marry her?”
“He’s head over ears in love with her.”
“Has he told you so?”
“No.
He doesn’t even know that I know.
He’s been so wretched, poor darling.
He’s been trying so hard not to hurt my feelings.”
“Perhaps it’s only a momentary infatuation,” I hazarded.
“It may pass.”
“Why should it?
Barbara’s young and pretty. She’s quite nice.
They’re very well suited to one another.
And besides, what good would it do if it did pass?
They love each other now and the present in love is all that matters.
I’m nineteen years older than Peter.
If a man stops loving a woman old enough to be his mother do you think he’ll ever come to love her again?
You’re a novelist, you must know more about human nature than that.”
“Why should you make this sacrifice?”
“When he asked me to marry him ten years ago I promised him that when he wanted his release he should have it.
You see there was so great a disproportion between our ages I thought that was only fair.”
“And are you going to keep a promise that he hasn’t asked you to keep?”
She gave a little flutter of those long thin hands of hers and now I felt that there was something ominous in the dark glitter of that emerald.
“Oh, I must, you know.
One must behave like a gentleman.
To tell you the truth, that’s why I’m lunching here today.
It was at this table that he proposed to me; we were dining together, you know, and I was sitting just where I am now.
The nuisance is that I’m just as much in love with him now as I was then.”
She paused for a minute and I could see that she clenched her teeth.
“Well, I suppose I ought to go.
Peter hates one to keep him waiting.”
She gave me a sort of little helpless look and it struck me that she simply could not bring herself to rise from her chair.
But she smiled and with an abrupt gesture sprang to her feet.
“Would you like me to come with you?”
“As far as the hotel door,” she smiled.
We walked through the restaurant and the lounge and when we came to the entrance a porter swung round the revolving doors.
I asked if she would like a taxi.
“No, I’d sooner walk, it’s such a lovely day.”
She gave me her hand.
“It’s been so nice to see you.
I shall go abroad tomorrow, but I expect to be in London all the autumn.
Do ring me up.”
She smiled and nodded and turned away.
I watched her walk up Davies Street.
The air was still bland and springlike, and above the roofs little white clouds were sailing leisurely in a blue sky.