"Oh, certainly the thing wasn't successful all round," Stephen hastily conceded.
"He said marriage wasn't invented solely to make people happy."
"Well, I suppose he's got an argument there. But you probably thought that the institution might chuck in a little more of that ingredient incidentally?"
"Rather my feeling—yes. You put things well too, now and then, Stephen."
"You suffer under the disadvantage of being a very attractive woman."
"We must bear our infirmities with patience, mustn't we?"
She was this evening in a rare vein of excited pleasure, gay, challenging, admirably provoking, exulting in her freedom, dangling before her own dazzled eyes all its possibilities. Stephen gave a deep chuckle.
"I think I'll go in and tell Tora that I'm infernally in love with you," he remarked, rising from his chair.
"It would be awfully amusing to hear what she says. But—are you?"
A rolling laugh, full of applause, not empty of pity, rumbled over the lawn as Stephen walked back to the house.