"But you're in love with him, aren't you? You may as well tell me," he continued, as she colored. "I must have some data to go on."
"I—I was in love with him," she faltered. "I suppose I am still. But while everything is as it is, I—I—can't tell; I—I don't know. I'm—I'm feeling so many other things that I don't know whether I feel—feel love—or not. I dare say I do. But it's like asking a man if he's fond of playing a certain game when he thinks he's going to die."
He slipped down into bed again, pulling the coverlet about his chin and turning his face away. As he said nothing more, she rose to go. "About eleven, then, papa dear."
She could hear a muffled assent as she left the room. She was afraid he was crying.
Nevertheless, when she had gone Guion rang for Reynolds and made his usual careful toilet with uncommon elaboration. By the time his guest arrived he was brushed and curled and stretched on the couch. If he had in the back of his mind a hope of impressing Ashley and showing him that if he, Guion, had fallen, it was from a height, he couldn't help it. To be impressive was the habit of his life—a habit it was too late now to overcome. Had he taken the Strange Ride with Morrowby Jukes, he would have been impressive among the living dead. Curiously enough, too, now that that possibility was past, he wondered if he didn't regret it. He confessed as much to Ashley.
"I know what you've come for," he said, when Ashley, who had declined a cigar, seated himself beside the couch.
"That means, I suppose, that Olivia has got ahead of me."
"She told me what you've proposed. It's very fine—very sporting."
"I haven't proposed it because it's either sporting or fine. It seems to me the only thing to do."
"Y-es; I can understand that you should feel so about it. I should myself if I were in your place and had a right to be generous. The trouble is—that it wouldn't work."