“I would rather give it to you.”
René’s horror sent him flying down to the gate. It was a minute or two before Linda came. She was smiling, and Mr. Fourmy had come out on to the doorstep to watch her walk down. René saw his eyes follow her and appreciate her movements, and he became acutely, alarmingly conscious that she also was a woman. He was frightened of her as she came up to him, but he was also angry, and he let fly:
“Linda, you can’t.”
“Can’t what?”
“You can’t let my father give you his beastly picture. You didn’t seem to mind. I thought you would. I thought you would. He sits all day doing those things over and over again.”
“Oh, René, don’t be silly. I’m older than you.”
That was the first he had heard of it, and it dashed him. That a man should love, could love a woman older than himself was in flat contradiction to all his notions. He was furious. Linda went on:
“Two years older. Twenty years older in experience and knowledge. You think like a silly little boy.”
In a rage he turned on his heel and left her. But at once a fierce hunger to be with her seized him, to clutch her by the arm as he had clutched her before, and to hurt her more, to feel her soft flesh yielding under his grip. That desire was stronger than his fury, and he ran after her, and caught her up just at the gates of Potter’s Park.
“I beg your pardon. I beg your pardon. I do beg your pardon. I can’t help it. I must be with you.”