She
felt now that she cared for none of them, that, one and all, they had
ceased to interest her; and that the things which filled their lives
were all vacant and meaningless forms. It was as if the vitality of
existence had been drained away, leaving an empty shell. Nothing was
real, nothing was alive but the aching core of her own wounded heart.
"I don't care. I won't let it spoil my life," she resolved while she bit
back a sob. "Whatever happens, I am not going to let my life be ruined."
She had repeated this so often that it had begun to drone in her mind
like a line out of a hymn-book; and she was still repeating it when she
swept by Stephen without so much as a word or a look. A dangerous mood
was upon her. Nothing mattered, she felt, if she could only prove to him
that she also had been trifling; that his kiss had meant as little to
her as to him; that from the beginning to the end she had been as
indifferent as he was.
Her step quickened into a run; and Gershom, striding, in order to keep
up with her, looked at her with the jovial laugh that she hated.
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