“He seems to be utterly insensible to danger. It is charming.”
“It is interesting to find that you have begun to understand him already. Dr. Johnson once said that few people who have lived with a man know what is remarkable about him. Probably he was right. Mrs. Johnson is known to have said that her husband was the most remarkable man she ever met, but there is no evidence that she knew what was remarkable about him.”
“There is nothing remarkable about Bert. It is one of his charms. I remember once that when mother was telling me I should acquire certain practical accomplishments upon which I might fall back in case of accident, I said that none of the professions attracted me, and that I preferred to be ‘just a plain lady.’ Well, Bert is just a plain gentleman. Are you laughing to hear me praise him?”
“I was not laughing. I was wondering whether you said such nice things to him—whether you thought it would be good for discipline.”
“Of course I say those things to him. When a woman marries a man she pays him the biggest compliment one human creature can pay another. Nothing that she can say after that can seem excessive, can it?”
“And yet, it will make quite a difference to him, I fancy, whether you do say those things or not. He paid you a compliment when he asked you to marry him, as large a one as he could possibly. Yet you will like to have him say things once in a while.”
She gave a little unreadable laugh. “Somehow I don’t expect to spoil Bert. Because he is just a plain gentleman, and not a genius or anything like that, I am not so nervous about him.”
“He ought to be very grateful. I have no doubt but that he is grateful. Do you know, I think you are quite as practical as if you were fashionably flippant and cynical? We always are drawing on our imaginations or our bank account. Undoubtedly we should be careful to avoid an overdraft. Marriage is a sort of promissory note.”
“That sometimes goes to protest?”