Edith herself could give no reason except that things of the kind invariably arranged themselves independently of reason. All she knew was that at first she was disposed to worship him because of his illustrious origin, and gradually she lost this feeling and grew to love him for himself. And with that explanation and him she was content.
He, being a man, could not, of course, admit he did anything without not only a reason but an excellent reason too. He began by saying that she was even lovelier than Dora herself, which was a thing more astonishing in one at all like Dora that it counted for more than an even still more wonderful beauty of another type. Then he had been chiefly drawn towards the girl during her tardy convalescence because of her weakness and dependence, and the thousand little services he could render her, which kept him always watchful and attentive when near her, and devising little pleasures of fruit or flowers, or books, when not by her side.
"I do not believe," he would say to himself, "that I was ever in love with Dora. I do think we should never have got on well together, and I am certain when she and Whinfield are married, there will not be a happier couple in England excepting Edith and me. When I heard that Dora was to be one of the party on the homeward cruise of Whinfield's yacht, I knew all would be arranged before they saw England again. They are most admirably suited to one another.
"But she and I were not. I was always thinking of what I should like her to do and what I should not, and her political views had a serious interest for me, and I was perpetually trying to get her to adopt this, and modify that, and abandon the third. Nice way of making love, indeed!
"I never went forth to her with song and timbrel and careless joy. My mind ran more on propositions and principles. If at any time she said what I did not approve, I was ready to stop and argue the point. I did not know what love was then, and if I married Dora, I should have worn down her heart and turned into a selfish, crusty old curmudgeon in no time.
"But with Edith all was different. I never thought for a moment of what I should like her to do or say or think. I only thought of what the girl might like. I lost hold of myself, and did not care for searching in the mirror of the mind as to how I myself looked, or how she and I compared together. I did not pause to ask whether I was happy or not, so long as I saw she was happy. There was no refinement in the other feeling. It was sordid and exacting. With Edith a delicate subtlety was reached, undreamed-of before. An inspired accord arose between us. She leaned upon me, and I grew strong enough to support the burden of Atlas. I flung myself aside, so that I might not be impeded in my services to her. And I was welcomed in the spirit I came. She would take what I had to give, and she would like to take it. And so she accepted me, and all I had, and I had no care in my mind of myself or any of the gifts or graces which had been mine and now were hers. So I had enough time to think of her and no care to distract me from her."
That was his way of putting it to himself when he was in a very abstract and figurative humour. When he was not quite so abstract or figurative, he would say to himself, "It is sympathy, nothing more than sympathy. That is the Miracle Gold we should all try to make in the crucible of our hearts."