"And
they know I'm lying. Oh, I don't deceive them, however hard I try. They
don't tell me so, but they know. I can't help it, I must do it. I must
sit and do it, knowing that they know it's a lie. For decency's sake I
must do it, though. Some people believe, the Mildmays believe; but you
here don't. You know me too well, and you know him too well."
"For God's sake, don't talk like that," said Marchmont.
"Don't talk like that! The talk's not the harm. If you could tell me how
not to live like that!" Her self-control broke utterly; she covered her
face with her hands and sobbed.
"For God's sake!" he murmured again.
"Oh, you don't know. This is only the crown of it. It goes on every day.
I'm coming not to know myself, not to be myself. I live scheming and
lying. I've given everything, all my life. Must I give myself, my own
self, too? Must I lose that for him?"
Her bitter despairing words seemed to him what at that moment her mood
made them seem to herself, the all-sufficient all-embracing summary of
her life; she had then no thought of another side to it, and into that
she gave him no insight.
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