“Never mind my guests,” she answered. “I have been wanting to talk to you alone for days. Why have you done this? Why are you here? What is it that you are seeking for in life?”
“A little amusement only,” he declared. “I cannot find it except amongst my own kind.”
“You have not the appearance of a pleasure seeker,” she answered.
“Mine is a passive search,” he said. “I have some years to live—and of solitude, well, I have tasted at once the joys and the depths.”
“You are not in love with me any longer, are you?” she asked.
“I am not bold enough to deny it,” he answered, “but do not be afraid that I shall embarrass you with a declaration. To tell you the truth, I have not much feeling left of any sort.”
“You mean to keep your own counsel, then?” she asked.
“It is so little to keep,” he murmured, “and I have parted with so much!”
She measured the emotion of his tone, the curious yet perfectly natural indifference of his manner, and she shivered a little. Always she feared what she could not understand.
“I had hoped,” she said sadly, “that we might at least have been friends.”