Page:Storm Over Paris.pdf/73

Yaska squinted so that only two narrow openings were visible beneath the heavy eyebrows. "What do you mean how I know?" he said. "All you have to do is go downstairs and be convinced for yourself."

Suddenly, without change of tone, he seized her hand, peered sharply at her, and said: "Do you think I'm blind Anna? What sort of devil's brew are you cooking up in that head of yours? Do you think that just because you've closed your eyes, nobody else sees anything either? You silly ostrich!"

Anna was stunned by this sudden attack. She freed herself from his grasp and stepped to the window, looking blankly into space.

"You're quiet. You have nothing to say," he continued "you're a world in yourself, shut like a clam. The problems of others don't touch you." Deep creases showed on his forehead. He dug his hands inside his trouser pockets and began to walk back and forth across the room. He came to a halt at the table and again began to fiddle with the corner of the cloth. His broad shoulders shrugged nervously. The close, curly hair glistened with dampness.

"I was just at Gertrude's," he said after a while. "She's sick. Morris isn't home . . .Don't look at me like this-I'm not suggesting anything. . . My God, how was I supposed to know that your delicate bourgeois soul would be upset so easily. And even if you are, the heavens won't weep on account of it!"

With the last words he walked swiftly to the door and went out.

• * *

On the bed in her squalid room on the rue Julian Lacroix, Gertrude lay pale as a corpse, trying to control the chattering of her teeth. Although it was still light outside, the gas lamp