She signified again that she followed him.
"But the finding of a new land doesn't take anything from the old one. It only enlarges the world. Europe didn't become different because they discovered America. The only change was in their getting to know a country where the mountains were higher, and the rivers broader, and the sunshine brighter, and where there was a chance for the race to expand. Evie remains what she was. The only difference is that my eyes have been opened to—a new ideal."
It was impossible for her not to guess at what he meant. Independently of words, his earnest eyes told their tale, while he bent toward her like a man not quite able to restrain himself. In the ensuing seconds of silence she had time to be aware of three distinct phases of emotion within her consciousness, following each other so rapidly as to seem simultaneous. A throb of reckless joy in the perception that he loved her was succeeded by the knowledge that loyalty to Conquest must make rejoicing vain, while it flashed on her that, having duped herself once in regard to him, she must not risk the humiliating experience a second time. It was this last reflection that prevailed, keeping her still and unresponsive. After all, his new ideal might be something—or some one—quite different from what her fond imagining was so ready to believe.
"I suppose," she said, vaguely, for the sake of saying something, "that trial is the first essential to maturity. We need it for our ripening, as the flowers and fruit need wind and rain."
"And there are things in life," he returned, quickly, "that no immature creature can see. That's the point I want you to notice. It explains me. In a way, it's an excuse for me."
"I don't need excuses for you," she hastened to say, "any more than I require to have anything explained."
"No; of course not. You don't care anything about it. It's only I who do. But I care so much that I want you to understand why it was that—that—I didn't care before."
She felt the prompting to stop him, to silence him, but once more she held herself back. There was still a possibility that she was mistaking him, and her pride was on its guard.
"It was because I didn't know any better," he burst out, in naïve self-reproach. "It was because I couldn't recognize the high, the fine thing when I saw it. I've had that experience in other ways, and with just the same result. It was like that when I first began to hear good music. I couldn't make it out—it was nothing but a crash of sounds. I preferred the ditties and dances of a musical comedy; and it was only by degrees that I began to find them flat. Then my ear caught something of the wonderful things in the symphonies that used to bore me. You see, I'm slow—I'm stupid—"
"Not at all," she smiled. "It's quite a common experience."