XI
They were both a little constrained upon the journey back to Versailles—and both felt it. But when they turned into the Porte St. Antoine Theodora woke up.
"Do you know," she said, "something tells me that for a long, long time I shall not again have such a happy day. It can't be more than half-past five or six—need we go back to the Reservoirs yet? Could we not have tea at the little café by the lake?"
He gave the order to his chauffeur, and then he turned to her.
"I, too, want to prolong it all," he said, "and I want to make you happy—always."
"It is only lately that I have begun to think about things," she said, softly—"about happiness, I mean, and its possibilities and impossibilities. I think before my marriage I must have been half asleep, and very young."
And Hector thought, "You are still, but I shall awake you."
"You see," she continued, "I had never read any novels, or books about life until Jean d'Agrève. And now I wonder sometimes if it is possible to be really happy—really, really happy?"
"I know it is," he said; "but only in one way."