"G.J., you're astounding!"
"No, I'm not. I'm just myself."
"And hasn't it upset your nerves?"
"Not as far as I can judge. Of course one never knows, but I think not. What do you think?"
She offered no response. At length she spoke with queer emotion:
"You remember that night I said it was a message direct from Potsdam? Well, naturally it wasn't. But do you know the thought that tortures me? Supposing the shrapnel that killed Queen was out of a shell made at my place in Glasgow!... It might have been.... Supposing it was!"
"Con," he said firmly, "I simply won't listen to that kind of talk. There's no excuse for it. Shall I tell you what, more than anything else, has made me respect you since Queen was killed? Ninety-nine women out of a hundred would have managed to remind me, quite illogically and quite inexcusably, that I was saying hard things about poor old Queen at the very moment when she was lying dead on the roof. You didn't. You knew I was very sorry about Queen, but you knew that my feelings as to her death had nothing whatever to do with what I happened to be saying when she was killed. You knew the difference between sentiment and sentimentality. For God's sake, don't start wondering where the shell was made."
She looked up at him, saying nothing, and he savoured the intelligence of her weary, fine, alert, comprehending face. He did not pretend to himself to be able to fathom the enigmas of that long [272] glance. He had again the feeling of the splendour of what it was to be alive, to have survived. Just as he was leaving she said casually:
"Very well. I'll do what you want."
"What I want?"