"Probably not. I should as soon think of falling in love with a weeping figure on a tombstone."
"What kind of women do you fall in love with?" asked Betty, irresistibly. She was sure of herself now. The passions of women are often calmed by the presence of their lover. Passion is so largely mental in them that it reaches heights in the imagination that reality seldom justifies and mere propinquity quells. For this reason they often are recklessly unfair to men, who are made on simpler lines.
They had floated under the spreading arms of a thicket on the water's edge, and she was a brilliant white figure in the gloom.
"I have no recipe," he said, smiling. "Certainly not with the women that weep, poor things!" Betty wondered what his personal attitude was to the tears of twenty years. She knew from Sally that Mrs. North had long attacks of depression. But his mind had been occupied; that meant almost everything. And his heart?
"Do you love anybody now?" she broke out. "Is there a woman in your life? Some one who makes you happy?"
The smile left his lips. It was too much to say that it had been in his eyes, but they changed also.
"There is no woman in my life, as you put it. Why do you ask?"
"Because I want to know."
They regarded each other squarely. In a moment he said deliberately: "The greatest happiness that I have had in the past few months has been my friendship with you. If I were free, I should make love to you. If you will have the truth, I can conceive of no happiness so great as to be your husband. I have caught myself dreaming of it—and over and over again. But as it is I am not going to make love to you. When the strain becomes too great, I shall leave you. Until then—Ah, don't!"
Betty, who had dropped her head when he began to speak, had raised it slowly, and her face concealed nothing.