"We sat a long time together that evening, with his arm round me, and he talked and I listened, but I was not listening to him. I was listening to love. I knew then that I had never lived before, never known anything before. I seemed to have waked up suddenly in Paradise, and I was dazed. Perhaps he did not realize that. It was like walking in a long, long field of lilies under a new moon. I told him it was like that, and he said it was the same to him. Perhaps he thought he had said things to show me his meaning. Perhaps he thought father had told me. But I did not understand. And then--a few hours later--I had to understand suddenly, without any warning. I thought he had gone mad, but it was I who went mad. And I locked myself into my room, and crept out of the house at dawn, when all was quiet. I realized father had sold me. That was why I told you I had no home to go to.... And I walked and walked in the early morning in the river mist, not knowing what I was doing. At last, when I was worn out, I went and sat where there was a lot of wood stacked on a great wharf. No one saw me because of the mist. And I sat still and tried to think. But I could not think. It was as if I had fallen from the top of the house. Part of me was quite inert, like a stupid wounded animal, staring at the open wound. And the other part of me was angry with a cold anger that seemed to mount and mount: that jeered at everything, and told me I had made a fuss about nothing, and I might just as well go back and be his mistress--anybody's mistress: that there was nothing true or beautiful or pure or clean in the world. Everything was a seething mass of immorality and putrefaction, and he was only the same as all the rest.... And all the time I could hear the river speaking through the mist, hinting at something it would not quite say. At last, when the sun was up, the mist cleared, and workmen came, and I had to go. And I wandered away again near the water. I clung to the river, it seemed to know something. And I went and stood on the Pont Neuf and made up my mind. I would go down to Melun and drown myself there.... And then Mr. Le Geyt came past, whom I knew a little--a very little. And he asked me why I was looking at the water. And I said I was going to drown myself. And he saw I meant it, and made light of it, and advised me to go down to Fontainebleau with him instead, for a week. And I did not care what I did. I went with him. I was glad in a way. I thought--_he_--would hear of it. I wanted to hurt him." "You did not know what you were doing." "Oh yes, I did. I didn't misunderstand again--I was not so silly as _that_. It was only the accident of Dick's illness which prevented my going wrong with him." Mrs. Stoddart started. "Then you never----" she said diffidently, but with controlled agitation. "No," said Annette, "but it's the same as if I had. I meant to." There was a moment's silence.