"I haven't really explained well," said Margaret. "What I'm sure of is that I'm not as much in love with him as I want to be in love."
"You're living opposite a looking-glass," said Guy. "That's what is the matter."
They had reached the stile leading over into the high road, and Margaret gazed back wistfully at the footprints in the snow, before they crossed it and went on their way.
"Yes," she said. "I am conceited. But my conceit is really cowardice. I long for admiration, and when I am admired I despise it. I lie in bed thinking how well I play the 'cello, and when I have the instrument by me I don't believe I can play even moderately well. I am really fond of him, but the moment I think that anybody else is thinking about my being fond of him I almost hate his name. I can't bear the idea of going to live in India and I detest bridges—you know he builds bridges—and yet I couldn't possibly write to him and say that he must think no more about me. I'm really a mixture of Monica and Pauline, and so I'm not as happy as either of them."
"Yes, I suppose Pauline is very happy," said Guy in a depressed voice.
"What am I to do?" Margaret asked.
"I'm sure you're much more in love than you think," he declared quickly, for he had the ghost of a temptation to tell her she was foolish to think any more of a love so uncertain as hers. There was enough jealousy of his standing at the Rectory to give him the impulse to rob Richard of his foothold, but the meanness destroyed itself on this virginal morning almost before Guy realized it had tried to exist. "Yes, I'm sure you're really in love," he repeated. "I think I can understand what you feel."
"Do you?" said Margaret shaking her head a little sadly. "I'm afraid it's only a very willing sympathy on your part, for I'm sure I don't understand myself. That's why I'm conceited, perhaps. I'm trying to build up a Margaret Grey for other people to look at, which I admire like any pretty thing one makes oneself, and perhaps why I can't fall really in love is because I'm afraid of someone's understanding me and showing me to myself."
"You'd have to be very clever to disappoint that person," said Guy. "And why shouldn't Richard Ford be the one?"
"Oh, he'll never discover me," said Margaret. "That's what's so dull."