"Listen," he said. He was shaking her. "I'm going away." Eyes watched each other. She looked until the face she had once kissed became entirely strange. There was no Lief, no lover. But a face staring murderously into hers. But there was something else. Tears behind the stare. Why was he weeping? The question like a tiny visitor sat down in her mind. He let her go and walked from the room, grabbing his hat and coat into his hands as he went. Doris listened. Down the stairs. Outside. He was gone. She went to the window. Her eye had swelled and her cheek pained. She sat down and looked into the street. "He hit me," she was whispering to herself. She began to weep with shame. But her tears seemed to soften her heart toward him. He had cried too. She arose and went to the bed. Here she had lain with him. Warm, familiar hours. Here her arms had held him. She threw herself down and wept aloud. II. 13. George Basine was going to see his sister Doris. In the nine years since she had left her mother's home she had become a strange woman to Basine. She had always been strange to him. But now it was as if she were entirely unhuman. He could talk to her without shame of things that were shameful. But there was something more tangible in her presence than the joy of being able to confess things to her. She was practical in her ideas. She gave him hunches for his speeches sometimes and what she said about people and how to make an impression on them was always of value. She understood such things. How, he couldn't determine. It was probably an instinct with her. Basine walked along in the spring afternoon. It was Sunday and he should have stayed home. Henrietta had been angry when he left. Sunday was his day for her and the two children. There were two children now--one a boy of seven, and a girl of five. But he said, "I want to see Doris. She's been feeling rather off lately. And if you don't believe I'm going there, why just call up in an hour. And keep on calling every hour if you want to keep check on me." He was always angry with his wife when he left her. She made him feel that he was doing wrong, although she seldom said anything. But to go away and leave her on Sunday was wrong. But not for the reasons she sometimes hinted at.