"Then let's not make the worst mistake of all," she said.
"But we could do so much—"
She turned upon him suddenly, pale, excited. "Do not!" she cried. "Do not use those words! It seems to me that that is what all men think and say. 'How much we could do—together!' Do not say that to me."
At this he sobered. "Then there is some one else?" he said slowly.
"You've heard some one else use those words? I couldn't blame him.
Well, I wish him happiness. And I wish you happiness, too. I had
no right to presume."
"Happiness!—what is that?" she said slowly. "I've been trying to find it all my life. My God! How crooked were all the mismated planets at my birth! I haven't been happy myself. I do not think that I've added one iota to the happiness of any one else, I've just failed, that's all. And I've tried so hard—to do something, something for the world! Oh, can a woman—can she, ever?" For once shaken, she dropped her face an instant in her hands, he standing by, mute, and suffering much as herself at seeing her thus suffer.
"But now," she continued after a time, "—I want to ask you whether
I've been ungenerous or vindictive with you—"
"Vindictive? You? Never! But why should you be?"
"Captain," she said easily, "my lieutenant, my friend, let me say—I will not be specific—I will not mention names or dates; but do you think, if you were a woman, you could ever marry a man who once, behind your back, with not even eagerness to incite him, but coolly, deliberately—had played a game of cards for—you?"
He stiffened as though shot. "I know. But you misunderstand. I did not play for you. I played to relieve a situation—because I thought you wished—because it seemed the solution of a situation hard for both of us. I thought—"
"Solution!" She blazed up now, tigerlike, and her words came through set lips. "I'd never have told you I knew, if you hadn't said what you have. But—a solution—a plan—a compromise! You ought to have played for me! You ought to have played for me; and you ought to have won—have won!"