“I write to be read. . . . I remember you once said that love was merely preference raised to a higher degree than like. But as your experience has grown perhaps you are willing to admit there are different degrees in the temperature of love itself?”
“Looks like it.” Gita drew her black brows together. “I merely accept the fact because I have to.”
Bylant had laid down his pipe and was twisting his short pointed beard. He eyed her speculatively, but not coldly. She looked warm and rosy and alluring in the deep chair, with her tumbled hair and bright eyes, and he would have given his new novel to kiss her; he half believed the time of his probation was shrinking. He had intended to wait for the woods and summer, but there was no harm in putting out an antenna or two.
“Don’t you ever feel you’re missing something?” he asked.
“I? What? Oh, you mean because I can’t make a fool of myself like other women. No, I don’t.” But she blushed unaccountably.
Eustace interpreted the blush as an uneasy response to a fact long ignored. “Gita!” he exclaimed, suddenly illuminated by a brilliant idea. “Let’s play a game. We can’t discuss intellectual subjects forever. We’d dry up. It’s time to strike a lighter note. Suppose we pretend we are not married and I’ve come wooing. And you are rather interested, but uncertain; willing to lead me on; curious to see if I could make an impression on your hard little heart. Pretty certain you’ll throw me over, but curious enough to give me a chance.”
Gita stared at him with mouth open. “What a perfectly ridiculous idea!”
“Not at all. Scientific matrimony. A science more married people would do well to study, and the keynote is variety. Besides, I’ve been working so long I feel in the mood for play.”
Gita dug the toe of her boot into the rug. “I don’t think I could play up. You see, I know I couldn’t fall in love with you.”
Bylant turned cold, but he answered steadily: “It would be a part of your end of the game to make yourself think you might. You have imagination, if you would consent to use it. You’re not nearly so matter-of-fact as you like to think.”