“Listen, then,” he said, bending over and speaking slowly. “Listen carefully.
Pay strict attention to what I’m saying. You must understand every word, and do as I tell you.
You are not seriously injured.
You will be all right.
This will blow over.
I have sent for another doctor to call on you at your studio.
Your husband has gone for some fresh clothes.
He will come back in a little while.
My carriage will take you home when you are a little stronger.
You mustn’t worry.
Everything will be all right, but you must deny everything, do you hear?
Everything!
In so far as you know, Mrs. Cowperwood is insane.
I will talk to your husband to-morrow.
I will send you a trained nurse.
Meantime you must be careful of what you say and how you say it.
Be perfectly calm. Don’t worry.
You are perfectly safe here, and you will be there.
Mrs. Cowperwood will not trouble you any more.
I will see to that.
I am so sorry; but I love you.
I am near you all the while.
You must not let this make any difference.
You will not see her any more.”
Still he knew that it would make a difference.
Reassured as to Rita’s condition, he went back to Aileen’s room to plead with her again—to soothe her if he could.
He found her up and dressing, a new thought and determination in her mind.
Since she had thrown herself on the bed sobbing and groaning, her mood had gradually changed; she began to reason that if she could not dominate him, could not make him properly sorry, she had better leave.
It was evident, she thought, that he did not love her any more, seeing that his anxiety to protect Rita had been so great; his brutality in restraining her so marked; and yet she did not want to believe that this was so.
He had been so wonderful to her in times past.
She had not given up all hope of winning a victory over him, and these other women—she loved him too much—but only a separation would do it.
That might bring him to his senses.
She would get up, dress, and go down-town to a hotel.
He should not see her any more unless he followed her.
She was satisfied that she had broken up the liaison with Rita Sohlberg, anyway for the present, and as for Antoinette Nowak, she would attend to her later.
Her brain and her heart ached. She was so full of woe and rage, alternating, that she could not cry any more now.
She stood before her mirror trying with trembling fingers to do over her toilet and adjust a street-costume.
Cowperwood was disturbed, nonplussed at this unexpected sight.
“Aileen,” he said, finally, coming up behind her, “can’t you and I talk this thing over peacefully now?
You don’t want to do anything that you’ll be sorry for.
I don’t want you to.
I’m sorry.
You don’t really believe that I’ve ceased to love you, do you?
I haven’t, you know.
This thing isn’t as bad as it looks.
I should think you would have a little more sympathy with me after all we have been through together.
You haven’t any real evidence of wrong-doing on which to base any such outburst as this.”
“Oh, haven’t I?” she exclaimed, turning from the mirror, where, sorrowfully and bitterly, she was smoothing her red-gold hair.
Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes red.
Just now she seemed as remarkable to him as she had seemed that first day, years ago, when in a red cape he had seen her, a girl of sixteen, running up the steps of her father’s house in Philadelphia.