She was frightened, and the terror in her face brought him to her
quickly.
"Natalie! Don't look like that! I don't believe it, of course. It's
stupid. I wasn't going to tell you. You don't think I believe it, do
you?"
She let him put an arm around her and hold her, as he would a scared
child. There was no love for her in it, but a great pity, and acute
remorse that he could hold her so and care for her so little.
"Oh, Clay!" she gasped. "I've been perfectly sick about it!"
His conviction of his own failure to her made him very tender. He talked
to her, as she stood with her face buried in the shoulder of his coat,
of the absurdity of her fear, of his own understanding, and when she was
calmer he made a futile effort to make his position clear.
"I am not angry," he said. "And I'm not fudging you in any way. But you
know how things are between us. We have been drifting apart for rather
a long time. It's not your fault. Perhaps it is mine. Probably it is.
I know I don't make you happy. And sometimes I think things have either
got to be better or worse."
"If I'm willing to go along as we are, I think you should be."
"Then let's try to get a little happiness out of it all, Natalie."
"Oh, happiness! You are always raving about happiness. There isn't any
such thing."
"Peace, then. Let's have peace, Natalie."
She drew back, regarding him.
"What did you mean by things having to be better or worse?"
When he found no immediate answer, she was uneasy. The prospect of any
change in their relationship frightened her. Like all weak women, she
was afraid of change. Her life suited her. Even her misery she loved and
fed on. She had pitied herself always. Not love, but fear of change,
lay behind her shallow, anxious eyes. Yet he could not hurt her. She had
been foolish, but she had not been wicked. In his new humility he found
her infinitely better than himself.
"I spoke without thinking."
"Then it must have been in your mind. Let me see the clipping, Clay.
I've tried to forget what it said."
She took it, still pinned to the prospectus, and bent over them both.
When she had examined them, she continued to stand with lowered eyelids,
turning and crumpling them. Then she looked up.