‘Philosophy is a queer thing,’ said Marcia. ‘You may go as far as you please, but you always end where you started.’
‘“Bubbles that glitter as they rise and break on vain philosophy’s aye-bubbling spring,”’ he repeated softly, with his eyes on the fire; and then he leaned toward her and laughed again. ‘Miss Marcia, do you know I have an idea?’
‘What is it?’ she asked.
‘It’s about you and me—I have a theory that we might be pretty good friends.’
‘I thought we’d been friends for some time,’ she returned evasively. ‘I am sure my uncle’s friends are mine.’
‘Really, I hadn’t suspected it! But it’s the same with friends as with politics and religion: they don’t amount to much until you find them for yourself.’
She considered this in silence.
‘I should say,’ he added, ‘that we’d been pretty good enemies all this time. What do you say to our being friends, for a change?’
Marcia glanced away in a sudden spasm of shyness.
‘Shall we try it?’ he asked in a low tone, bending toward her and laying his hand palm upward on the arm of her chair.