"Never! But she's none the less his wife, and you're not," said Mrs. Gereth, getting up. "Our only chance is the chance she may die." Owen's face, at this, showed a reviving dread, the fear of some darksome process of her mind. "If you speak for yourself I can understand, but why is it hideous for me?"!

"So have I things to say to you, Mrs. Brigstock!" Owen interjected. With this he took up his hat as if for an immediate departure. Fleda vaguely demurred. "His dreadful quarrel?"

"For you, but not for your eloquence. Do you understand what I mean by the difference?" Mrs. Gereth asked as she stood stirring her tea. She had once more disengaged herself, with the private vow that he shouldn't yet touch her again. It was all too horribly soon—her sense of this was rapidly surging back. "We mustn't talk, we mustn't talk; we must wait!" she intensely insisted. "I don't know what you mean by your freedom; I don't see it, I don't feel it. Where is it yet, where, your freedom? If it's real there's plenty of time, and if it isn't there's more than enough. I hate myself," she protested, "for having anything to say about her: it's like waiting for dead men's shoes! What business is it of mine what she does? She has her own trouble and her own plan. It's too hideous to watch her and count on her!" "You're not all right—you're all wrong!" Fleda cried in despair. "You mustn't stay here, you mustn't!" she repeated with clear decision. "You make me say dreadful things, and I feel as if I made you say them." But before he could reply she took it up in another tone. "Why in the world, if everything had changed, didn't you break off?"