Again Cecily kept silence.  Mrs. Travis, observing her, saw an offended look rise to her face.

“I mean, we are few of us, us women, strong enough to hold out against natural and social laws.  We feel indignant, we suffer more than men can imagine, but we have to yield.  But it is true that most women are wise enough not to act in my way.  You are quite right to despise me.”

“Why do you repeat that?  It is possible you are acting quite rightly.  How should I be able to judge?”

“I am not acting rightly,” said the other, with bitterness.  “Two courses are open to a woman in my position.  Either she must suffer in silence, care nothing for the world’s talk, take it for granted that, at any cost, she remains under her husband’s roof; or she must leave him once and for ever, and regard herself as a free woman.  The first is the ordinary choice; most women are forced into it by circumstances; very few have courage and strength for the second.  But to do first one thing, then the other, to be now weak and now strong, to yield to the world one day and defy it the next, and then to yield again,—­that is base.  Such a woman is a traitor to her sex.”

Cecily did not lift her eyes.  She heard the speaker’s voice tremble, and could not bear to look at her face.  Her heart was sinking, though she knew not exactly what oppressed her.  There was a long silence; then Cecily spoke.

“If your husband persuaded you to return, it must have been that you still have affection for him.”

“The feeling is not worthy of that name.”

“That is for yourself to determine.  Why should we talk of it?”

Looking up, Cecily found the other’s eyes again fixed on her.  It was as though this strange gaze were meant to be a reply.

“Would it not be better,” she continued, “if we didn’t speak of these things?  If it could do any good—­But surely it cannot.”

“Sympathy is good—­offered or received.”

“I do sympathize with you in your difficulties.”

“But you do not care to receive mine,” replied Mrs. Travis, in an undertone.

Cecily gazed at her with changed eyes, inquiring, offended, fearful.

“What need have I of your sympathy, Mrs. Travis?” she asked distantly.

“None, I see,” answered the other, with a scarcely perceptible smile.

“I don’t understand you.  Please let us never talk in this way again.”

“Never, if you will first let me say one thing.  You remember that Mr. Elgar once had doubts about my character.  He was anxious on your account, lest you should be friendly with a person who was not all he could desire from the moral point of view.  He did me justice at last, but it was very painful, as you will understand, to be suspected by one who embodies such high morality.”

There was no virulence in her tone; she spoke as though quietly defending herself against some unkindness.  But Cecily could not escape her eyes, which searched and stabbed.