“She's had a great anxiety.”
“She has no anxiety now. Max is doing well.”
“Then what is it?”
“I'm not quite sure, but I think I know. She's lost faith in Max, and she's not like me. I—I knew about Palmer before I married him. I got a letter. It's all rather hideous—I needn't go into it. I was afraid to back out; it was just before my wedding. But Sidney has more character than I have. Max isn't what she thought he was, and I doubt whether she'll marry him.”
K. glanced toward the street where Sidney's name and Max's lay open to the sun and to the smiles of the Street. Christine might be right, but that did not alter things for him.
Christine's thoughts went back inevitably to herself; to Palmer, who was doing better just now; to K., who was going away—went back with an ache to the night K. had taken her in his arms and then put her away. How wrong things were! What a mess life was!
“When you go away,” she said at last, “I want you to remember this. I'm going to do my best, K. You have taught me all I know. All my life I'll have to overlook things; I know that. But, in his way, Palmer cares for me. He will always come back, and perhaps sometime—”
Her voice trailed off. Far ahead of her she saw the years stretching out, marked, not by days and months, but by Palmer's wanderings away, his remorseful returns.
“Do a little more than forgetting,” K. said. “Try to care for him, Christine. You did once. And that's your strongest weapon. It's always a woman's strongest weapon. And it wins in the end.”
“I shall try, K.,” she answered obediently.