“Mr. Manning, I do not think I love you.... I want to be very plain with you. I have nothing, nothing that can possibly be passion for you. I am sure. Nothing at all.”
He was silent for some moments.
“Perhaps that is only sleeping,” he said. “How can you know?”
“I think—perhaps I am rather a cold-blooded person.”
She stopped. He remained listening attentively.
“You have been very kind to me,” she said.
“I would give my life for you.”
Her heart had warmed toward him. It had seemed to her that life might be very good indeed with his kindliness and sacrifice about her. She thought of him as always courteous and helpful, as realizing, indeed, his ideal of protection and service, as chivalrously leaving her free to live her own life, rejoicing with an infinite generosity in every detail of her irresponsive being. She twanged the catgut under her fingers.
“It seems so unfair,” she said, “to take all you offer me and give so little in return.”
“It is all the world to me. And we are not traders looking at equivalents.”