“Can you love me in return?” Everard went on, his face still nearer. “Am I anything like this to you? Have the courage you boast of. Speak to me as one human being to another, plain, honest words.”
“I don’t love you in the least. And if I did I would never share your life.”
The voice was very unlike her familiar tones. It seemed to hurt her to speak.
“The reason.—Because you have no faith in me?”
“I can’t say whether I have or not. I know absolutely nothing of your life. But I have my work, and no one shall ever persuade me to abandon it.”
“Your work? How do you understand it? What is its importance to you?”
“Oh, and you pretend to know me so well that you wish me to be your companion at every moment!”
She laughed mockingly, and tried to draw away her hand, for it was burnt by the heat of his. Barfoot held her firmly.
“What is your work? Copying with a type-machine, and teaching others to do the same—isn’t that it?”
“The work by which I earn money, yes. But if it were no more than that—”