Only one answer is possible to such a question. Cecil gave it.
“That is all very well,” Eve pursued with equal gravity and charm. “But it was really tremendously sudden, wasn’t it? I can’t think what you see in me, dearest.”
“My dear Eve,” Cecil observed, holding her hand, “the best things, the most enduring things, very often occur suddenly.”
“Say you love me,” she persisted.
So he said it, this time. Then her gravity deepened, though she smiled.
“You’ve given up all those—those schemes and things of yours, haven’t you?” she questioned.
“Absolutely,” he replied.
“My dear, I’m so glad. I never could understand why——”
“Listen,” he said. “What was I to do? I was rich. I was bored. I had no great attainments. I was interested in life and in the arts, but not desperately, not vitally. You may, perhaps, say I should have taken up philanthropy. Well, I’m not built that way. I can’t help it, but I’m not a born philanthropist, and the philanthropist without a gift for philanthropy usually does vastly more harm than good. I might have gone into business. Well, I should only have doubled my millions, while boring myself all the time. Yet the instinct which I inherited from my father, the great American instinct to be a little cleverer and smarter than someone else, drove me to action. It was part of my character, and one can’t get away from one’s character. So finally I took to these rather original ‘schemes,’ as you call them. They had the advantage of being exciting and sometimes dangerous, and though they were often profitable, they were not too profitable. In short, they amused me and gave me joy. They also gave me you.”
Eve smiled again, but without committing herself.