The House of Souls
'But what was it?'
'Oh, I'd rather not tell you, Edward. It's not pleasant. I scolded Alice for repeating it to me.'
Darnell got up and took a small, frail chair near the sofa.
'Tell me,' he said again, with an odd perversity. He did not really care to hear about the household next door, but he remembered how his wife's cheeks flushed in the afternoon, and now he was looking at her eyes.
'Oh, I really couldn't tell you, dear. I should feel ashamed.'
'But you're my wife.'
'Yes, but it doesn't make any difference. A woman doesn't like to talk about such things.'
Darnell bent his head down. His heart was beating; he put his ear to her mouth and said, 'Whisper.'
Mary drew his head down still lower with her gentle hand, and her cheeks burned as she whispered—
'Alice says that—upstairs—they have only—one room furnished. The maid told her—herself.'
With an unconscious gesture she pressed his head to her breast, and he in turn was bending her red lips to his own, when a violent jangle clamoured through the silent house. They sat up, and Mrs. Darnell went hurriedly to the door.
'That's Alice,' she said. 'She is always in in time. It has only just struck ten.'
Darnell shivered with annoyance. His lips, he knew, had almost been opened. Mary's pretty handkerchief, delicately scented from a little flagon that a school friend had given her, lay on the floor, and he picked it up, and kissed it, and hid it away.
32
