heaps of white. She sat motionless, her arms at rest. His mother seemed
far away. The pounding recommenced unsteadily at his wrists, the room
wavered in his vision. Ludowika permeated him like a deep draught of
intoxicating, yellow wine. He had a curious sensation of floating in
air, of tea roses. It was clear that, folded in happy contentment, she
still realized nothing.... She must know now, any minute. Howat saw that
his mother had gone.

He rose and stood before Ludowika, leaning slightly over her. She
raised her gaze to his; her interrogation deepened. Then her expression
changed, clouded, her lips parted; she half raised a hand. Her breast
rose and fell, sharply, once. Howat picked her up by the shoulders and
crushed her, silk and cool gauze and mouth, against him. Ludowika's
skirts billowed about, half hid, him; a long silence, a long kiss.

Her head fell back with a sigh, she drooped again upon the sofa. She
hadn't struggled, exclaimed; even now there was no revolt in her
countenance, only a deep trouble. "Howat," she said softly, "you
shouldn't have done that. It was brutal, selfish. You--you knew, after
all that I told you; the premonition--" she broke off, anger shone
brighter in her eyes. "How detestable men are!" She turned away from
him, her profile against the brocade of the sofa. Unexpectedly he was
almost cold, and self-contained; he saw the gilded angle of a frame on
the wall, heard the hickory disintegrating on the hearth.

He had kissed her as a formal declaration; what must come would come. "I
was an imbecile," she spoke in a voice at once listless and touched with
bitterness; "Arcadia," she laughed. "I thought it was different here,
that you were different; that feeling in my heart--but it's gone now,
dead. I suppose I should thank you. But, do you know, I regret it; I