"Yes," said Tredennis, "I remember it."
"I could not bear the thought of not being happy," she went on. "It had never occurred to me that such a thing was a possibility until you said something which suggested it to me. I recollect how it startled me. It was such a new idea."
She stopped and lay for a moment silent.
"And this morning?" suggested Tredennis.
"This morning," she answered, rather slowly, though smiling as she spoke, "this morning, as I said, I decided that I had been very fortunate."
"Then," he said, "you have been happy."
"If I had not been," she answered, "it would have been very curious. I have never been interfered with in the least."
"That is happiness, indeed," said Tredennis.
Just now he was reflecting upon the fact that all their conversations took the same turn and ended in the same way. It mattered little how they began; in all cases she showed the same aptitude for making her subject an entirely inconsequent source of amusement. Experience was teaching him that he need expect nothing else. And, even as he was thinking this, he heard her laugh faintly again.
"Shall I tell you what I see in your face," she said,—"what I see oftener than anything else?"