There wasn't a tremor in her voice or
bearing, the slightest indication that they were going farther than a
theatre in the vicinity of Forty-fourth Street. Internally, Lee was
excited, filled with the long strange sense of holiday.
"William went to the club," Savina told him with a smile edged with
malice; "everything was as usual when he left, but when he gets back it
will be changed. I'm sorry to miss his expression when he reads the
letter I wrote; he won't show it to anyone."
"That sounds as though you really disliked him," Lee observed. Then he
remembered the hatred he had felt for Fanny. Matrimony had a brutal
hand for superficial relationships and conventions. He had spoken
lightly but, watching her, he saw the grimness of her passion strike
the animation from her face. The jewel case slid over the softness of
her wrap to the floor, her hand crept under his cuff, clinging to his
arm.
Going immediately to their train, they found the fruit in the drawing-
room; the porter stopped to knock at the door and discover if they were
in need of his attendance. They heard dimly the train's muffled boring
under the river and were conscious of the swimming lights of the Jersey
plain, the confused illuminated darkness of cities, the tranquility of
open country, the ringing echo of bridges and the sustained wail of
their locomotive. They were, again, reaching Washington, close in a
taxi-cab; Savina's jewel case again fell unheeded; and again, after the
shortest halt possible, they were whirling south in a drawing-room
where night and day were indistinguishable one from the other.
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