She said that her eyes weren’t very strong.
She said that she was homesick.
She said that all that, however, did not lessen his kindness, that she hadn’t believed anybody could be so kind, that it was quite impossible to thank him properly: and then stopped, because she really did find it impossible.
She was perfectly sincere in every word she said, and not once, not once did she remember the good offices of the directresses and Monsieur La Motte.
There remained Oliver. She must set herself to the danaïd task of bottling-up Oliver.
She felt it to be a hopeless business. Convincing Justin was like battering down a wall, laborious, but it could be done; but convincing Oliver was like wrestling with running water. He did not resist you, he simply slipped through your fingers. He had good manners: he waited courteously while you expressed yourself; but he never listened. Just as his eyes moved incessantly while he talked to you, so you felt that his mind was, all the time, eagerly working at what he meant to go on saying when you had done. It was easier to send a boat up a torrent than to lodge a thought of your own in that fluent, brimming soul.
Perhaps she did not try hard, or if she did, for love of the argument rather than the man. She was still young enough to believe that argument is a kind of spy-glass into a neighbour’s mind instead of a cracked mirror that distorts your own. Growing bored, she had lapsed into a mere listener, except when he annoyed her. But he, finding her passivity even more provocative than her temper, could not leave her alone, and when she refused Justin’s proposals and he heard of it, fell upon her with enthusiastic indignation.
“You know, I can’t make you out!” Oliver prided himself on understanding women. “What made you stuff up Justin with all that rot? You’re not a fool. You know what you can do. ‘No real talent!’ What are you driving at? That’s what I want to know.”
Laura studied her morning’s work. It was slight enough. The sky was white, the hills were blue, and cypresses pierced the all-pervading haze of the olive groves; but Italy—Italy—was warm in every loving line of it. She realized, as she looked at it, how nearly Oliver was justified; but her only answer was a queer little fleeting smile. Sometimes it was difficult to resist Oliver. She knew exactly how he felt. She believed that that was why he annoyed her—she saw in him all the tendencies she tried to repress in herself. Here, but for the grace of—she hardly knew what—went Laura Valentine! It made her brusque with him and impatient, yet always, as I say, with a queer accompanying smile that Oliver misinterpreted. He misinterpreted it now. He thought she wanted encouraging. He warmed to her.
“My dear girl! You’ve got to believe in yourself. One must. I do. People won’t give you sixpences for your stuff if you insist it’s not worth tuppence—and after all, one’s out for sixpences! You’ve got to be sure of yourself—so sure that you never even think of it. I am. But to sit there as you do and brood over whether you’re any good——”