"Oh, I should be afraid. I couldn't. I hate Russia!"
"But you don't know it."
"No," answered Etta, turning away and busying herself with her long
silken train. "No, of course not. Only Petersburg, I mean. But I have
heard what it is. So cold and dismal and miserable. I feel the cold so
horribly. I wanted to go to the Riviera this winter. I really think,
Paul, you are asking me too much."
"I am only asking a proof that you care for me."
Etta gave a little laugh--a nervous laugh with no mirth in it.
"A proof! But that is so bourgeois and unnecessary. Haven't you proof
enough, since I am your wife?"
Paul looked at her without any sign of yielding. His attitude, his whole
being, was expressive of that immovability of purpose which had hitherto
been concealed from her by his quiet manner. Steinmetz knew of the
mental barrier within this Anglo-Russian soul, against which prayer and
argument were alike unavailing. The German had run against it once or
twice in the course of their joint labors, and had invariably given way
at once.
Etta looked at him. The color was coming back to her face in patches.
There was something unsteady in her eyes--something suggesting that for
the first time in her life she was daunted by a man. It was not Paul's
speech, but his silence that alarmed her. She felt that trivial
arguments, small feminine reasons, were without weight.
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