"She ... he belongs to her ..." she said aloud, trying to bring coherence to her thinking by the uttered words. "He belongs ... to her...." A slow warmth went through her body, into her cheeks to make them flame fiercely. That was a sense of guilt coming over her, shaming her, torturing her, and behind it, inspiring, urging it along, giving it strength, was that conscience of hers. At other times she had defied that older self; only that evening she had regained some of the ground from which it had driven her by its last assault, lifting herself above the judgments she had been trained to respect because, in transgressing them, she had experienced a free, holy joy that had never been hers so long as she had remained within their bounds. But now! That cry for escape was gone. She had been stealing another woman's man ... and such a woman! Never before had she faced such ugly truths as the girl had poured upon her. Of the cancerous places in the social structure she had known, of course; at times she had even gone so far as to judge herself a wide-awake, keen-seeing woman, but now ... she shuddered as the woman's words came back to her, "White or black or red or brown; but their money was all th' same color." That was too horrible, too revolting; she could not accept it with a detached point of view. Its very truth--she did not doubt it--smirched her, for she had been stealing the man of such a woman! Oh, that conscience was finding its revenge! That day it had been outraged, had been all but unseated; but now it came back with a vengeance. She, the lawful wife of Ned Lytton, had plotted to win Bruce Bayard. No, she had not! one part of her protested, as she weakened and sought for any escape that meant relief. You did, you did! thundered that older self. By passively accepting, as a fact, her want of him, she had sinned. By finding joy in his touch, at sight of him, she had grievously wronged not only Ned and herself but all people. She was a contaminated thing! She was as bad, worse than Nora Brewster, because, while Nora had sinned, she admitted it, had done it openly, and frankly while she, Ann Lytton, had covered it with a cloak of hypocrisy, had refused to admit her transgressions even to herself and lied and distorted happenings, even her thoughts, until they were made to appease her craven heart! "She said it; she said it!" Ann muttered aloud. "She said that I was a hypocrite. She said ... she did not hide!" Then, for a moment, she was firm, drawing her body, even, to firmness to contend more effectively against these suggestive accusations. What matter if she were married? What if Bayard did love an abandoned woman? What mattered anything but that she loved him?