It was evident they had been quarreling, for the man looked sullen and the woman, half turned away, shrugged her shoulders to what he was saying.
Georgia had been watching them. "Too bad," said she, "they're having a row."
"Perhaps they're not meant for each other."
"Everyone quarrels sometimes," she answered, "meant or not."
"Do you think we would, if——"
"I'm sure of it," she replied sharply. "We're human beings, not angels."
There was doubtless common sense in what she said, but nevertheless it delighted him not. He wished that she could in such moments as these, yield herself fully to the illusion which possessed him that their life together would be one sempiternal climax of joy.
"I honestly believe," he asserted solemnly, "that sometimes two natures are so perfectly adjusted that there is no friction between them."
"Rubbish," she replied, quoting a newly read Shaw preface, "people aren't meant to stew in love from the cradle to the grave."
She couldn't understand her own mood. She had arranged this evening with Stevens to tell him that she was ready to marry him, and she found herself unable to. Her conscious purpose was the same as ever.