The young woman seated so inappropriately at the desk, gazing so meaninglessly into pigeon-holes, made no reply. And now Charles Garrott was walking toward her, walking as the entranced walk, fascinated, staring with fixed eyes that had forgotten how to wink.
"What're you talking about? I don't know what you mean! Why, what's happened—what's gone wrong?"
Mary Wing grew restless under his questionings; she spoke with obvious effort: "Nothing's happened—nothing's gone wrong. I say, I simply decided that I wouldn't—take the position, after all. I decided I would refuse it. So I was writing to Dr. Ames—to explain ... That's all I can say."
But the man standing over her looked more spellbound than ever.
"Explain!—explain what?... Why—you can't put me off like this—can you?" said he, all his stiffness so shattered by her thunderbolt, all his struggle but for some effect of poise. "You must know—I'm tremendously interested. And—I'm obliged to feel that something pretty serious has happened to make you—"
"No!—nothing has happened at all, I've said. I assure you—nothing."
"But ... You can't imagine how absolutely in the dark ... Do you mean you've found something else you'd rather do—here?"
"I suppose that's one way of putting it—yes.... Why, I simply say that when the time came—I wasn't able to do it, that's all.... No, I didn't want to do it—that must have been it. Of course, people always do what they really want most."
"You didn't want to do what?... You know, that's just what I don't quite understand."
"But I've just told you," she protested; and there stopped short.