"How nice of you!" she exclaimed, with genuine appreciation of what is, after all, the extremest compliment a man can pay a woman. "It's a most wonderful thing to tell me, but I'm afraid it's not much use as a comparison. For you've only got it slightly, whereas I'm in love with Terry just ... just tremendously."
"Are you really?"
"Yes."
It was then that I realized how lovely she was. The admission had brought a heightened colour into her cheeks, and as she sat there, waiting for me to say something, I saw in her again that utmost beauty that includes and yet is beyond the merely physical—a challenge rather than a statement.
She smiled at me suddenly. "Don't look so serious. Have some more tea.... That's right.... I'm glad I've told you, anyway. Do you think it's very awful?"
"It may be—for you," I answered.
"For me?" She laughed. "Why, I'm not a bit afraid. It's so wonderful and interesting—so far—that I wouldn't give it up whatever happened. Do you know—" her eyes glowed with sharp excitement—"since it began to—to happen—all life seems to have caught fire.... Do you know what I mean? Everything is so—so different—so splendid...."
There were bright tears in her eyes as she spoke. She went on: "But of course you're thinking of Geoffrey. Well, you needn't worry—he'll never need to know anything about it. He's so sure of his own powers of fascination that he'd want a lot of convincing that I could possibly be interested in anybody else."
I nodded. That was shrewd and very probably true. "Well, anyhow," I said, after a pause, "what are you going to do about it?"
"Do about it?" she repeated. "Do about it? Why, there's nothing to do, except to go on being in love for the first time in my life."