Kimberly sat down in the corner of a davenport. "Nor am I, doctor. Nor am I talkative--you understand, I know."
"I have been reading this pretty little French story." Hamilton had the book in his hand. "Mrs. MacBirney gave it to you. I have been thinking how like her it seems--the story itself--elevated, delicate, refined----"
"It happens to be the only book she ever gave me."
Hamilton looked again at the inscription on the fly-leaf, and read in Alice's rapid, nervous hand:
"From Alice, To Robert."
"What slight chances," the doctor went on, "contribute sometimes to our treasures. You will always prize this. And to have known and loved such a woman--to have been loved by her--so much does not come into every man's life."
Kimberly was silent. But Hamilton had come to talk, and disregarding the steady eyes bent suspectingly upon him he pursued his thought. "To my mind, to have known the love of one woman is the highest possible privilege that can come to a man. And this is the thought I find in this book. It is that which pleases me. What surprises me in it is the light, cynical view that the man takes of the responsibility of life itself."
"All sensualists are cynical."
"But how can a man that has loved, or treasures, as this man professes to treasure, the memory of a gifted woman remain a sensualist?"
Kimberly shrugged his shoulders. "Men are born sensualists. No one need apologize for being a sensualist; a man should apologize for being anything else."