"Because you are you."
"In a derogatory sense?"
"Somewhat. I might be like you if I were a man, and had your easy, airy, inconsequential way with women. But I won't let you have it with me, my casual friend. Don't hope for it."
"What have I ever done——"
"Exactly what you're doing now to Rosalie—what you did to a dozen women this winter—what you did to me"—she turned and looked at him—"the first time I ever set eyes on you since we were children together. I know you are not to be taken seriously; almost everybody knows that! And all the same, Duane, I've thought about you a lot in these two months up here, and—I'm happy that you've come at last.... You won't mistake me and try to be sentimental with me, will you?"
She laid her slim, sun-tanned hand on his arm; they walked on together through the woodland where green bramble sprays glimmered through clustering tree trunks and the fading light turned foliage and undergrowth to that vivid emerald which heralds dusk.
"Duane," she said, "I'm dreadfully restless and I cannot account for it.... Perhaps motherless girls are never quite normal; I don't know. But, lately, the world has seemed very big and threatening around me.... Scott is nice to me, usually; Kathleen adorable.... I—I don't know what I want, what it is I miss."
Her hand still rested lightly on his arm as they walked forward. She was speaking at intervals almost as though talking in an undertone to herself:
"I'm in—perplexity. I've been troubled. Perhaps that is what makes me tolerant of you; perhaps that's why I'm glad to see you.... Trouble is a new thing to me. I thought I had troubles—perhaps I had as a child. But this is deeper, different, disquieting."
"Are you in love?" he asked.