“I am not judging you. I accept you just as you are.”
“Accept!” he grumbled. “Accept! When you keep me at arm’s-length!”
“I go as far as we can, then it breaks down.”
“What breaks down?”
“I don’t know what to call it. Sympathy, if you like.”
“Oh! then if it breaks down it isn’t any good, and we may as well give it up for ever. I will learn to shuffle along without you.”
“I won’t shuffle. I refuse to hear of your shuffling.”
“Then you want to know what to do?”
“What?”
“Take your place by my side, walk along with me like a sober, decent woman.”