"Well, then, it is no good my telling you that I love you, for you know that already. And it is no good my attempting to tell you how much I love you, because I could never do that if I talked from now till doomsday."
"Still, it wouldn't be a bad way of passing the time from now till then," Fay remarked.
"Then we'll pass it so, my darling," I said, kneeling down beside her sofa and taking her in my arms, "and eternity shall be passed in the same way, after doomsday is over. And even then I shan't have half told you how much I love you." And I kissed her full on the lips, and for the first time in my life knew the ecstasy of human love.
After a few minutes of blissful silence, Fay remarked: "If I try to tell you how much I love you, I shall have my work cut out for me too; and if I have to do it between now and doomsday it will take me all I know to get it done in the time."
"Do you love me so very much, my little Fay?"
"Frightfully much, ridiculously much, far, far more than you deserve."
"But I am so old, sweetheart—so much too old for you. That is what is worrying me."
Fay cuddled up to me, laughing contentedly. "I know. I have watched it worrying you for ages. I have seen you for months now trying to work out a sum that if you take away eighteen from forty-two nothing remains, and you couldn't get it right."
"Still nothing did remain when there seemed a chance of eighteen being taken away from forty-two; absolutely nothing at all."
Fay laughed again, a little gurgling laugh of pure delight. "How dreadfully clever you are! If you go on being as clever as that you'll have a headache, or softening of the brain, or something of that kind. You make me quite anxious about you."