Jean shrank. She could not talk of that to him.
"Yes," she said shortly. "I had something to do with it, but so had a lot of other people."
But she would lead. It was her way to lead and then to share the credit. It was the old, maddeningly generous way. No, she had not changed, not really, no matter what she said. Her life had gone as she had planned it. Nothing had swerved her from her ideal of work and success. Hard and cold and intrinsically selfish, she had forced life to her will. And he: a cloying affair with The Kitten, more and shorter affairs, always seeking, never finding, wasted through his own capacity to feel, dragged down by the biggest thing in him, the weakness that might have been a strength.
If Jean had cared! It would have taken such a little from her store of patience and faith in herself. She had been niggardly, hoarded it for herself.
"You have had a lot," he said at last, "everything you ever wanted."
From the tragic emptiness of his eyes Jean turned her own. Before his, the emptiness of her days stood clean and filled with happy memories.
"I have had a lot."
The grotesquely carved balcony vanished into the tea-room of the upper thirties. Instead of Herrick, heavy and soft with regret, Gregory sat, strong and happy in his success, and she had wished for a moment that he had not won, and had been proud and miserable and weak with love. Tears rushed to Jean's eyes and she bit her lip to keep them back.
Herrick started. Not even to Jean could work alone bring that look. Slowly the color left his face.
"You—have found out what love is, too."