Then this was the end of all romance? She must turn her back on thecharm, the power, the spell that had been wrought around her, and,horror-struck, pry into her own mind to discover what lawless thingcould be in her to have drawn her to such a person, and to keep her,even now that she knew the worst, unwilling to relinquish the thought ofhim. His depravity loomed to her enormous; but was that all there was tobe said of him? Did his delicacy, his insight, his tempered fineness,count for nothing beside it? Must their talks, their walking through thetrees, the very memory of his voice, be lost inspiration?
She couldn't believe that this one spot could make him rottenthroughout. Her mind ran back into the past. She could not recall aword, an action, or a glance of his that had shown the color of decay.He had not even been insincere with her. He had come out with hisconvictions so flatly that when she thought of it his nonchalanceappalled her. He had been the same then that he was now. But the thingthat was natural for him was impossible for her, and she had found itout--that was all.
Yet the mere consideration of him and his obsession as one thing wasintolerable. She curiously separated his act from himself. She thoughtof it, not as a part of him, but as something that had invaded him--adisease--something inimical to himself and others, that mixed thethought of him with terrors, and filled her way with difficulties. Nowit was no longer a question of how to meet him, but of how she was notto. It was not his strength she feared, but her own weakness where hewas concerned. Her tendency to shield him--she must guard againstthat--and that disturbing influence he exercised over her, tooevidently without intention. But he would be hard to avoid. This way andthat she looked for a way out of her danger, yet all the while she wasconscious that there was but one plain way of escape open to her. Shecould give the sapphire back to Harry within the twenty-four hours.