“It is always the same,” she whispered... “Always the same. Your desires—the desire of the moment, first. I don’t believe you ever loved me, though at one time you professed so much.”
“At least, I did not love an ideal,” he answered. “I loved the flesh and blood that is you.”
She turned her head slowly and looked at him.
“That is it,” she answered bitterly... “The flesh and blood! ... The fairness of the flesh... All that the flesh means you care for.”
“Oh! I’m materialistic,” he admitted. “I’ve no fancy for falling in love with a dream.”
He followed her, and took up his position again close to her, with his hands behind him, looking steadily into her eyes.
“Until I met you,” he said, “I never realised how closely allied vice and virtue are. You are so very virtuous that to knock up against your purity flings a man back on himself and inclines him to the other extreme. I’ve always looked on intolerance as a vice. ... You are intolerant—most good people are. If only intolerance realised the amount of evil it is directly responsible for! But you’ll wonder at my impertinence in preaching to you... Indeed, I wonder at myself.”
“Go on,” she said hoarsely. “Perhaps—when you are gone—I shall remember.”
“Good Lord!” he cried. “I don’t want you to remember. Put me out of your thoughts altogether.”
“Ah! if we could command our thoughts,” she said.