“Don’t you want to go on being friends?”

“Look here—are you going to make me say—what I don’t want to say?”

“Yes, if I can! I want everything clear and plain between us. You’re the first real friend I’ve ever had, and I’m not going to lose you through any stupid misunderstanding.”

“Well, then; I couldn’t go on being friends. I’d ... it would have to go on—to something else.”

She was perfectly still.

“You know what I mean, don’t you?” he asked.

“Yes ... I know,” she answered, in an odd, flat voice.

“And you don’t want that....”

“I don’t know,” she said, “whether I do or not.”

He was so startled that he sprang to his feet.