"How do you make that out?"
"Have you forgotten? When you were going to Paris—before you were going to Paris even—I tried to show you that I wanted you to give up the work. I remember you promised things. You said you'd write books, or do essays for the weeklies...."
"But, dear, you can't make a living writing books—unless you fluke, or unless you're a genius; as for essays for the weeklies, frankly, I don't believe I can do them—I'm not brilliant enough."
"Yes, you are," Elizabeth urged. (Fatal mistake to make, it smoothed all his vanity the right way.) "I believe in you, Humphrey. If I didn't believe in you, I wouldn't be talking as I am now. And, besides, I've told you before, I have enough for us both."
Though she was offering him freedom; though, if he wished, he could accept her offer and be rid for ever from the torments of Fleet Street, he could not leave its joys.
"You don't understand," he said. "You couldn't expect me to live on you...."
"Why not? I should be prepared to live on you, if I were poor."
"That's different. You're a woman."
She laughed. "We won't go into the side-issues of arguments over ethics," she said. "You need not live on me. You told me that you had saved four hundred pounds. If we lived simply that would keep us both for a start, and you could be adding to your income by writing. Humphrey, don't you see I'm trying to rescue you. I want you to do something fine and noble; I want you to go forward."