She did not understand what he meant, and yet she felt as
if he spoke the truth, as if this inexplicable mystery were yet indeed no
fiction, no phantasy, but stern fact, and as if, strangely, she had at
the back of her mind divined it, known it when she first knew Valentine,
yet only realized it now that he himself told her. She did not speak. She
only looked at him, turning white slowly as she looked.
"I am Marr," he repeated. "Now do you understand my gospel? Understand it
if you can, for you are bereft of the power that belongs of right only to
the woman who is pure. Long ago, perhaps, you might have fought me. Who
knows, you might even have conquered me? But you have thrown yourself to
the wolves, and they have torn you till you are only a skeleton. And how
can a soul dwell in a skeleton? Your soul, your will, is as useless as
that vagrant soul of Valentine, which I expelled into the air and into
the night. It can do nothing; you can do nothing either. If I have ever
feared you, and hated you because I feared you, I have fooled myself. I
have divined your thoughts. I have known your enmity against me, and your
love--_yours_!--for Julian. But if the soul and the will of Valentine
could not save Julian from my possession, how can yours? You are an
outcast of the streets! Go back to the streets.
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