The light was quite golden now; the dahlias seemed on fire under it.
“Mary,” said Stefan, “I've been thinking a lot about you lately.”
“Have you, dear?”
“Yes, I never tried to understand you in the old days. I had never met your sort of woman before, and didn't trouble to think about you except as a beautiful being to love. I was too busy thinking about myself,” he smiled. “I wondered, without understanding it, where you got your strength, why everything you touched seemed to turn to order and helpfulness under your hands. I think now it is because you are always so true to life—to the things life really means. Every one always approves and upholds you, because in you the race itself is expressed, not merely one of its sports, as with me.”
She looked a little puzzled. “Do you mean, dearest, because I have children?”
“No, Beautiful, any one can do that. I mean because you have in perfect balance and control all the qualities that should be passed on to children, if the race is to be happy. You are so divinely normal, Mary, that's what it is, and yet you are not dull.”
“Oh, I'm afraid I am,” smiled Mary, “rather a bromide, in fact.”
He shook his head, with his old brilliant smile.
“No, dearest, nobody as beautiful and as vital as you can be dull to any one who is not out of tune with life. I used to be that, so I'm afraid I thought you so, now and then.”
“I know you did,” she laughed, “and I thought you fearfully erratic.”