She gave the little foreign shrug she had almost forgotten. "I will listen, of course. Need I add that I am highly honored? If I were not so astonished, no doubt I should be more properly appreciative of that honor. Pray let me hear the reasons." Her tone was satirical, but she was beginning to feel vaguely uneasy.
Neither her words nor her inflections ruffled the calm of that long immobile face with its half-veiled powerful eyes.
"Let us avert all possible misunderstandings at the beginning," he said suavely. "I shall not pretend that I have fallen in love with you again, for although my gallantry prompts me to such a natural statement, I have not the faintest hope of deceiving you. What I felt for you once can never be revived, for I loved you more than I have ever loved any woman; and when such love burns itself out, its ashes are no more to be rekindled than the dust of the corpse. You thought I fell in love with my pretty young wife, but I was merely fond and appreciative of her. I knew that the end had come for us, and that if I did not recognize that sad fact, you would. My marriage, which, as you know, was imperative, afforded a graceful climax to a unique episode in the lives of both of us. There was no demoralizing interval of subterfuge and politely repressed ennui. On the other hand, it did not degenerate into one of those dreary and loosely knit liaisons, lasting on into old age. We left each other on the heights, although the cliff was beginning to crumble."
"Really, Moritz! I hope you have not come up here to indulge in sentimental reminiscence. Why rake up that old—episode? I assure you I have practically forgotten it."
"And I can assure you that I never felt less sentimental. I wish merely to emphasize the fact that it was complete in itself, and therefore as impossible of resuscitation as the dead. Otherwise, you might naturally leap to the conclusion that I was an elderly romantic gentleman——"
"Oh, never! It is obvious that you are inclined to be brutally frank. But, as you said, time is short."
"If what I said sounded brutal, it was merely to remind you that love—the intense passionate love I have no doubt you feel for this young man who helps you to realize your renewed youth—never lasts. And when this new love of yours burns itself out—you never had the reputation of being very constant, dear Marie—you will have an alien young man on your hands, while that remarkable brain of yours will be demanding its field of action. You are European, not American—why, even your accent is stronger than mine! That may be due to an uncommonly susceptible ear, but as a matter of fact your mind has a stronger accent still. You became thoroughly Europeanized, one of us, and—I say this quite impartially—the most statesman-like woman in Europe. Your mind was still plastic when you came to us—and your plastic years are long over, ma chère. If your mind had become as young as your body, you would have bitterly resented it. You were always very proud of that intellect of yours—and with the best of reasons."
Mary was staring out of the window. She recalled that she had faced the fact of the old mind in the young brain when she first discovered that she loved Clavering. How could she have forgotten … for a few short weeks—and up there?… She raised her eyes to the mountain. From where she sat she could not see the top. It looked like an impenetrable rampart, rising to the skies.
"Can you tell me with honesty and candor," he continued in those same gentle tones that had always reminded her of limpid water running over iron, "—and for all your subtlety your mind is too arrogant and fearless to be otherwise than honest au fond—that you believe you could remain satisfied with love alone? For more, let us say, than a year?"
She moved restlessly. "Perhaps not. But I had planned to live in Vienna. He would spend only a part of the year there with me. His own interests are here, of course. It would be a perfectly workable arrangement."