Twice she was on the
very point of crying out: "I am not Daphne Wing!" But each time pride
strangled the words in her throat. And yet they would have to come. What
other reason could she find to keep him from her room?
But when in her mirror she saw him standing behind her--he had crept
into the bedroom like a cat--fierceness came into her. She could see the
blood rush up in her own white face, and, turning round she said:
"No, Gustav, go out to the music-room if you want a companion."
He recoiled against the foot of the bed and stared at her haggardly, and
Gyp, turning back to her mirror, went on quietly taking the pins out of
her hair. For fully a minute she could see him leaning there, moving his
head and hands as though in pain. Then, to her surprise, he went. And a
vague feeling of compunction mingled with her sense of deliverance. She
lay awake a long time, watching the fire-glow brighten and darken on
the ceiling, tunes from "The Tales of Hoffmann" running in her head;
thoughts and fancies crisscrossing in her excited brain. Falling asleep
at last, she dreamed she was feeding doves out of her hand, and one of
them was Daphne Wing. She woke with a start. The fire still burned, and
by its light she saw him crouching at the foot of the bed, just as he
had on their wedding-night--the same hungry yearning in his face, and an
arm outstretched.
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