Then his anger burst out in words. She need not give herself so much trouble. He would be her plaything no longer. She had given him up when she had gone home, and he could not love her any more. When he came home the day before yesterday from his hunting-trip and found her gone without a message, without a word, his blood ran cold in his veins, he had nearly died of grief. He could not love any one who had given him such pain. She had, besides, never loved him. She was a coquette, who wanted to have some one to kiss her and caress her when she was here in the country, that was all.
Did he think that she was in the habit of allowing young men to caress her?
Oh yes, he was sure of it. Women were not so saintly as they seemed. Selfishness and coquetry from beginning to end! No, if she could know how he had felt when he came home from the hunt. It was as though he had waded in ice-water. He should never get over that pain. It would follow him through the whole of his life. He would never be the same person again.
She tried to explain to him how it had all happened. She tried to convince him that she was still faithful. Well, it did not matter, for now he did not love her any more. He had seen through her. She was selfish. She did not love him. She had gone without leaving him a message.
He came continually back to that. She really enjoyed the performance. She could not be angry, she understood his wrath so well. She did not fear any real break between them. But at last she became uneasy. Had there really been such a change in him that he could no longer care for her?
“Gösta,” she said, “was I selfish when I went to Sjö after the major; I knew that they had small-pox there. Nor is it pleasant to go out in satin slippers in the cold and snow.”
“Love lives on love, and not on services and deeds,” said Gösta.
“You wish, then, that we shall be as strangers from now on, Gösta?”
“You are very changeable, Gösta Berling.”
He was cold, impossible to warm, and she was still colder. Self-consciousness sat and sneered at her attempt to act love.
“Gösta,” she said, making a last effort, “I have never intentionally wronged you, even if it may seem so. I beg of you, forgive me!”
She knew that if she had possessed a real feeling she could have won him back. And she tried to play the impassioned. The icy eyes sneered at her, but she tried nevertheless. She did not want to lose him.