"Mad—when you love me?" she said, with a melancholy smile.
"You know what I mean. You think that 'great wits to madness nearly are allied,' that sane as I appear, there is in me a hidden vein of madness. And yet, if anything, the generalization connecting genius with insanity is more unsound than that connecting it with domestic infelicity. It would require a genius to really prove such a connection, and as he would, on his own theory, be a lunatic, what becomes of his theory?"
"Your argument involves a fallacy," replied Ellaline quietly. "It does not follow that if a man is a lunatic everything he says or does has the taint of madness. A genius who held that genius meant insanity might be sane just on this one point."
"Or insane just on the one point. Seriously, Ellaline," said John Beveridge, beginning to lose his temper, "you don't mean to say that you believe that genius is really 'a psychical neurosis of the epileptoid order.' If you do you must be mad yourself, that's all I can say."
"Of course I should have to admit I am mad myself if I held the theory that genius meant insanity. But I don't."
"You don't!" he said, staring blankly at her. "You don't believe I'm insane, and you don't believe I'll make a bad husband—I should be insane if I did, my sweet little Ellaline. And you still wish to cry off?"
"I must."
"Then you no longer love me!"
"Oh, I beg of you, do not say that! You do not know how hard it is for me to give you up—do not make our parting harder."
"Ellaline, in heaven's name vex me no further. What is this terrible mystery? Why can you no longer think of me?"