Suddenly she straightened herself in her chair, and opened her
eyes widely. He saw her lovely breast, under its filmy black
chiffon, rise stormily. Her voice was rich with protest.
"No, you didn't mean anything, Greg, nobody means anything! Nobody
is anything but sorry for me: you, Billy, Elinor, the woman who
expected us at dinner to-night, the servants at the club!" she
said hotly. "Nobody blames me, and yet every one wonders how it
happens! Nobody thinks it anything but a little amusing, a little
shocking. I am to write the notes, and make the excuses, and be
shamed--and shamed--shamed--"
Her voice broke. She rose to her feet, and rested an elbow on the
mantel, and stared moodily at the fire. There was a silence.
"Rachael, I'm sorry!" Gregory said presently, impulsively.
Instantly her April smile rewarded him.
"I know you are, Greg!" she answered gratefully. "And I know," she
added, in a low tone, "that you are one of the persons who will
understand--when I end it all!"
"End it all!" he echoed sharply.
"Not suicide," she reassured him smilingly. She flung herself back
in her chair again, holding her white hand, with its ring, between
her face and the fire. "No," she said thoughtfully, "I mean
divorce."
There eyes met; both were pale, serious.
"Divorce!" he echoed, after a pause. "I never thought of it--for
you!"
"I haven't thought of it myself, much," Rachael admitted, with a
troubled smile.
As a matter of fact she had thought of it, since the early days of
her marriage, but never as an actual possibility. She had
preferred bondage and social position to freedom and the
uncomfortable status of the divorced woman. She realized now that
she might think of it in a slightly different way. She had been a
penniless nobody seven years ago; she was a personage now. The
mere fact that he was a Breckenridge would win some sympathy for
Clarence, but she would have her faction, too.
More than that, she would never be younger, never handsomer, never
better able to take the plunge, and face the consequences.
"I'm twenty-eight, Greg," she said reasonably, "I'm not stupid,
I'm not plain--don't interrupt me! Is this to be my fate? I'm
capable of loving--of living--I don't want to be bored--bored--
bored for the rest of my life!"
Warren Gregory, stunned and surprised, eyed her sympathetically.
"Belvedere Bay bore you?" he asked, smiling a little uneasily.
"No--it's not that. I don't want more dinners and dances and
jewels and gowns!" Rachael answered musingly. She stared sombrely
at the fire, and there was a moment's silence.
Suddenly her mood changed. She smiled, and locking her hands
together, as she leaned far forward in her chair, she looked
straight into his eyes.