“But if you don’t care for him?”
“I do—in a way. He’s been so good and kind and patient and everything! And even if I didn’t care for him at all it would be just the same—after what I’ve let him think—the second time.”
I could see her reasoning, if reasoning it was, though it was not the uppermost thought in my mind. As a matter of fact, I was repeating her statement as to “one of the same men.” Which one of them was it? There had been three—the one she didn’t trust—the one she couldn’t have lived with—and the one who was only very nice. It would make such a difference which one it proved to be that I was afraid to ask her.
I burst out, desperately: “Oh, but why did you—let him think it—the second time?”
“I don’t know. It happened by degrees—by writing—in letters—and I didn’t see how far I was going. It was a kind of reaction.”
“Reaction from what?”
She looked at me wildly. “From you, I think. As far as I remember it became definite at Taplow.”
“When you were actually seeing me every day?”
“That was the reason. It was seeing you so cheerful and full of jokes—and not missing—not missing any one—nor ever mentioning them—not to a soul. It just convinced me of what I’d been sure of before—ever since the time at Atlantic City—that you didn’t—that you never had.... And so when he suggested it in one of his letters—I don’t know what made me!—but I didn’t say it was impossible.”
“What did you say?”