“Well, and what then?”
“You are not honest, that is what then.”
“Well,” he returned, “and what then?”
She was almost crying. “You exonerate yourself, you condone yourself, you say you would, you could, you will—some day, if—if thus and so. You think some better condition is going to bring the confidence to be what nature meant you to be; yes, you do think it, you do, you do. But it has to grow out of yourself. I can tell you that, and when the time you think for comes, to be what you’d like to be, you’ll have lost the power. I want to say it, I mean to say it, I want to hurt you, I hope my saying it can hurt you, so I can go away glad, glad I’ve hurt you. There, I’ve said it; don’t stop me, don’t; I came to say it and I’m going back now.”
He was breathing hard. “Oh, no,” he said, “you’re not.” He glanced around. Then he stepped down from the gallery and turned. “Come, let yourself go, I’ll steady you.”
She hesitated, brushing some wet from her cheek with her hand. She did not know until then there had been tears.
“Come,” he reiterated. It was the tone women, even Molly, obeyed.
She slipped down and he caught her and set her on her feet. “Pick up your dress,” he said, “the grass is wet.”
Everywhere, it seemed, there were couples strolling. Around to the right, by the side door, with its little, vine-covered pent-house, was a bench beneath a tree; Aunt Mandy and Mrs. Leroy aired their crocks and pans thereon. He led the way to it, spread out his handkerchief, and Alexina, gathering up her gleaming dress, sat down. The comical side of it must have occurred to him, the girl gathering up a dress fit for a princess, to sit there. He laughed, not an altogether humorous laugh.
“Illustrative of the true state of things, as it were,” he said. “I proffer my lady a milk-bench.”