I did leave her.
I have returned to you.
I am willing to explain or not, just as you please.
But one thing I do want to do, and that is to make up with you, get your forgiveness, go on and on with you alone.
You won’t believe it, but I promise you there won’t be any more of this.
Can’t you sense that?
Won’t you help me get back to some fair and equitable relation with you?
Think what we mean to each other!
I can help you, want to, will, whether you choose to break with me or not!
Won’t you believe that, Bevy?”
They were standing on a small green lawn bordering the Thames, under old trees, with the low thatches of a distant hamlet in view and curls of blue smoke rising from cottage chimneys.
All was peaceful about them.
But he was thinking that for all this sufficiency and the plain intention to make as little as possible of the provocation that had been given her, Berenice’s mood was not forgiving.
At the same time, he could not help contrasting her with other women under related circumstances, Aileen in particular.
Here was no brooding, weeping, quarreling woman.
Although, as he now also thought, and for the first time in his life, real love, true love, however destructive to the lover, might truly brood, weep, quarrel, and be forgiven for it, into the bargain.
On the other hand, here was certainly a type of affection which carried with it values which could not be denied or belittled.
Plainly, he had dulled them, and on the instant he became the shrewd, watchful, resourceful, and dynamic Cowperwood of the financial meeting room and parley.
“Listen to me, Bevy!” he said, firmly.
“About June twentieth I went down to Baltimore on a business matter . . .”
And from there on he related exactly what had happened.
The midnight return to his room.
Lorna’s knock.
All.
He told exactly how fascinated he had been; how and where he had entertained Lorna; the comments of the critics.
He persisted in the excuse that, like Berenice, Lorna had cast a spell.
He had intended no unfaithfulness.
It was something that had come over him, and, to make himself perfectly plain, he advanced the theory which had come to him because of this and other related affairs in the past: that there was something in sensual desire which superseded and therefore must be superior to reason and will.
For, in his case, it undermined and washed away any predetermined course.
“If I want to be honest,” he added at this point, “I must say that perhaps the only way to avoid lapses of this kind is to avoid any close contact with attractive women.
And that is not always possible, of course.”
“Of course not,” said Berenice.
“As you know,” he went on, determined to continue, “once you are close to a person like Lorna Maris, you have to be pretty tame to escape her.
And that’s a mighty strong admission from me.”
“Quite,” said Berenice.
“But I agree with you. She is very attractive.
But how about me in connection with other men?
Are you ready to grant me the same privilege?”
She gazed at him inquiringly, while he stared at her in return.
“Theoretically, yes,” he replied.
“Because I care for you, I would have to stand for it emotionally as long as I could, as long as it was necessary for me to do so.
After that, I would probably let you go, just as you will let me go if you don’t care enough to keep me.
But what I want to know now is, knowing what you do, do you care, my dear?
And that is very important, because I still care a great deal.”
“Well, Frank, you are asking me something which just at the moment I cannot really answer, because I don’t know.”
“But, as you see,” he persisted, “in this case her influence has not lasted, or I wouldn’t be here now.
And I am not offering this as an excuse, but as a fact.”
“In other words,” said Berenice, “she did not come on the same boat.”
“She is dancing in New York the whole winter.
And any American paper will tell you that.