‘Well, it’s just spoiling you.’
‘I love to be spoiled.’
‘Well, then, I thought to myself—If I can only have that woman for my own, I believe I will do something in life yet. And I also thought—If I don’t get that woman for my own, I will never, never be the same man again.’
‘Really, Frank, the very first day you saw me?’
‘Yes, the very first day.’
‘And then?’
‘And then, day by day, and week by week, that feeling grew deeper and stronger, until at last you swallowed up all my other hopes, and ambitions, and interests. I hardly dare think, Maude, what would have happened to me if you had refused me.’
She laughed aloud with delight.
‘How sweet it is to hear you say so! And the wonderful thing is that you have never seemed disappointed. I always expected that some day after marriage—not immediately, perhaps, but at the end of a week or so—you would suddenly give a start, like those poor people who are hypnotised, and you would say, “Why, I used to think that she was pretty! I used to think that she was sweet! How could I be so infatuated over a little, insignificant, ignorant, selfish, uninteresting—” O Frank, the neighbours will see you?’
‘Well, then, you mustn’t provoke me.’