THE MARRIAGE SHE HAD MISSED WAS ON HER MIND. IT CREATED AN OBSESSION OR A BROKEN HEART, I WASN'T QUITE SURE WHICH
Since there was nothing I could say in actual words, I merely murmured sympathetically. At the same time there came to me, like the slow breaking of a dawn, an illuminating glimpse of the great J. Howard's life. I seemed to be admitted into its secret, into a perception of its weak spot, more fully than his wife had any notion of. She would never, I was sure, see what she was betraying to me from my point of view. She would never see how she was giving him away. She wouldn't even see how she was giving away herself—she was so sweet, and gentle, and child-like, and unsuspecting.
I don't know for how many seconds her quiet, inconsequential speech trickled on without my being able to follow it. I came to myself again, as it were, on hearing her say:
"And if you do love him, oh, don't give him up!"
I grasped the fact then that I had lost something about Hugh, and did my best to catch up with it.
"I don't mean to, if either of my conditions is fulfilled. You heard what they were."
"Oh, but if I were you I wouldn't make them. That's where I think you're wrong. If you love him—"
"I couldn't steal him from his family, even if I loved him."