"
She stood with her hands to the beat of her throat, looking at him as if
he had hunted her into her corner, which he had not.
"Let me go," she said.
He seemed trying to gain control of his large, loose hands, clenching
and unclenching them.
"Good God!" he said. "What say?"
"It's no use! I've tried. I'm wrong. Something in me is stronger than
you or mamma or papa or--or environment. All my life I've been fighting
against just--just--this. And now I've let it trap me."
"Darn funny time to be finding it out."
"That's the terrible part! To think it took this--marriage--to awaken me
to a meaning of myself."
"Bah! Your meaning to yourself is no better than any other woman's."
"A month ago it would have been so simple--to have had the
courage--then. To have realized then! Why--why can life be like that?"
"Like what?"
"You remember the night coming home from the Highlands? I tried to tell
you. Something in me was rebelling. Ask mamma; papa. They knew! That's
been my great trouble. My desires for myself were never strong enough to
combat their desires for me. They've always placed me under such ghastly
obligation for their having brought me into the world.
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