“Is he in your story?”
“Yes, he is in my story.”
“I thought perhaps you didn't want me to come here any more,” she said.
“You didn't think so!” flashed Maurice.
“But you turned your cheek to me the last time I was here. You were too busy to do more than speak.”
Voicelessly he said: “I lay under your feet, my life, my love! You walked on me and never knew it.” Aloud he answered; “Was I so detestable? Forgive me. I am trying to learn self-control.”
“You are all self-control! If you have feeling, you manage very well to conceal it.”
“God grant it!” he said, in silence, behind his lips. “For the touch of your hand is rapture. My God! how hard it is to love so much and be still!” Aloud he said, “Don't you know the great mass of human beings are obliged to conceal their feelings because they have not the gift of expression?”
“Yes, I know,” answered Lily, defiantly.
“But that can never be said of you,” Maurice went on. “For you are so richly endowed with expression that your problem is how to mask it.”