“Yes, darling,” she said, “but feeling is no guide. If we all did what we felt, the world would become a madhouse. It is the control of reason that keeps it sane.”
He looked at her with a sort of humorous interrogation.
“I wondered if you would say something of the sort,” he said. “You don’t believe it, you know, in so far as it applies to my choice now!”
She thought over her simile about the engine’s puff of steam and the engine’s driver. It seemed to her extremely apt.
“I do believe it,” she said. “It is mere common sense.”
“Then I’ll ask you another question. You would be very much relieved if I took this appointment. But shouldn’t I lose a little of your respect?”
She fancied she could quibble that away.
“Respect?” she said. “What a word to use. As if that had got anything to do with love!”
He laughed outright, and in the fashion that was so common with him, sat down on the arm of her chair.
“That’ll never do,” he said. “You must learn to respect me.”