“No,” he said, then gave her a quick, eager glance. At sight of the quizzical expression in her eyes, he blushed furiously but did not look away.
“You know,” he said, and he put his arm about her shoulders, “that I love you in the way you wish to be loved. I don’t deny that I’m not very consistent. My theory is sound, but—I’m only a human man, and I’d rather my theory were not put to the test in your case.”
“But it has been put to the test,” she replied, “and it has stood the test.” And then she told him the whole story.
He called her brave. “No one but you, only you, would have had the courage to end it when you did—away off there, alone.”
“I thought it was brave myself at the time,” she said. “Then afterwards I noticed that it would have taken more courage to keep on. Any woman would have freed herself if she had been independent as I was, and with no conventionalities to violate.”
Stilson said thoughtfully after a pause: “It did not enter my head that you had been married. And even now, the fact only makes the whole thing more vague and unreal.”
“It took two minutes to be married,” replied Emily, “and less to be divorced—my lawyer wrote proudly that it was a record-breaking case for that court, though I believe they’ve done better elsewhere in Dakota.”
“What a mockery!”
“Oh, I don’t think so. The marriage isn’t made by the contract and the divorce isn’t made by the court. The mere formalities that recognise the facts may be necessary, but they can’t be too brief.”
“But it sets a bad example, encourages people to take flippant views of serious matters.”