"No," he said. "I dare not assume a responsibility so great."
"If I go with you," she said quietly, "I shall go on my own responsibility."
"Janet, it would be too wonderful. Don't let me think of it, or my good resolutions will stand no firmer than a flag in a strong wind. But you are an angel to offer to come. You do love me then, very, very much?"
"What a question, Claude!"
"Well, you keep a pretty tight rein on your feelings, darling," he said, with the least trace of reproach. "Tender and true you are, I know," he added. "But you don't say any of the things that girls say when their hearts are in the grip of a wild, extravagant passion. Do you know that you have never even asked me once whether I really and truly and madly love you?"
"Whether you love me?"
"Yes, that is the question girls ask their lovers over and over again."
"Well, Claude, the important thing to me is that I love you."
"Do you mean to say, Janet, that you don't care whether I love you or not?"
"I don't mean that. But what I care about most is that you are the sort of man whom I can love. That is the thing that makes me happy. It's delightful, of course, to know that you love me in return. Still, if you didn't love me, I don't think I should be in hopeless misery. If you turned out to be different from what I dreamed you were, so different that I could no longer love you, then I should be heart-broken."