He said:
"Oh, no! Not at this time! Besides the old furniture trade's probably not itself for the minute. . . ." He was obviously thinking of something else.
"I've probably been a low cad," he said, "wringing your heart with my doubts. But I wanted to see where our similarities come in. We've always been—or we've seemed always to me—so alike in our thoughts. I daresay I wanted you to respect me. . . ."
"Oh, I respect you! I respect you!" she said. "You're as innocent as a child."
He went on:
"And I wanted to get some thinking done. It hasn't been often of late that one has had a quiet room and a fire and . . . you! To think in front of. You do make one collect one's thoughts. I've been very muddled till to-day . . . till five minutes ago! Do you remember our drive? You analysed my character. I'd never have let another soul. . . But you see . . . Don't you see?"
She said:
"No! What am I to see? I remember . . ."
He said:
"That I'm certainly not an English country gentleman now; picking up the gossip of the horse markets and saying: let the country go to hell, for me!"