I may be hard, but I can respect sorrow."
To respect sorrow! Yes, this grey visitor could do that, as the wind
passing over the sea respects its surface, as the air respects the
surface of a rose, but to penetrate to the heart, to understand her
sorrow, that old age could not do for youth! As well try to track out
the secret of the twistings in the flight of those swallows out there
above the river, or to follow to its source the faint scent of the
lilies in that bowl! How should she know what was passing in here--this
little old woman whose blood was cold? And Audrey had the sensation of
watching someone pelt her with the rind and husks of what her own spirit
had long devoured. She had a longing to get up, and take the hand, the
chill, spidery hand of age, and thrust it into her breast, and say:
"Feel that, and cease!"
But, withal, she never lost her queer dull compassion for the owner
of that white carved face. It was not her visitor's fault that she had
come! Again Lady Casterley was speaking.
"It is early days. If you do not end it now, at once, it will only come
harder on you presently. You know how determined he is. He will not
change his mind. If you cut him off from his work in life, it will but
recoil on you. I can only expect your hatred, for talking like this, but
believe me, it's for your good, as well as his, in the long run.
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