"I believe we get a lot of our opinions simply by disliking what we see of other people's; we select their opposites."
"Reaction?"
"Yes; and then we feed what we've picked up till it grows quite strong."
They fell into silence again. Friendliness could not banish the sense of distance between them; they could agree, more or less, as to how they had come to be so far apart, but the understanding brought them no nearer. Even agreeing to differ is still differing. Both were rather sad, yet both were smiling faintly, as they walked side by side; it was very absurd that they had ever thought of being so much to one another. Yet it was a rather sorrowful thing that in future they were to be so very little to one another. Beneath their differences they had just enough of kinship to make them regret that the differences were so great, and so imperative in the conditions they imposed. A sudden impulse made Alice turn to him and say,
"I know you think I'm narrow; I hope you don't think I've been unkind or unfriendly. I did try to put myself in your place as well as I could; I never thought unkindly about you."
"How were you to put yourself in my place?" he asked, smiling at her. "I know you tried. But you'd have had to put yourself in somebody else's place as well."
"I suppose so," said Alice with a shake of her head; she certainly could not put herself in Ora Pinsent's place.
"After all, people are best in their own places," he went on. He paused for a moment, and added, "Supposing they can find out where their places are. You've found yours?"
"Yes," she answered. "Mine is the shop."
He sighed and smiled, lifting his hands. "I wonder where mine is," he said a moment later. For if his were not the shop, it had not seemed to be by Ora Pinsent either. "Perhaps I haven't got one," he went on. "And after all I don't know that I want one. Isn't it possible to keep moving about, trying one after another, you know?" He spoke lightly, making a jest of his question; but she had fallen into seriousness.