“A bride? Stephen!—I cannot—”
“You cannot help it, Sylvia.”
“I must! I have my way to go.”
“My way lies that way.”
“No! no! I cannot do it; it is not best for me—not best for you.... I do care for you; you have taught me how to say it. But—you know what I have done—and mean to do, and must carry through. Then, how can you love a girl like that?”
“Dear, I know the woman I love.”
“Silly, she is what her life has made her—material, passionately selfish, unable to renounce the root of all evil.... Even if this—this happiness were ours always—I mean, if this madness could last our wedded life—I am not good enough, not noble enough, to forget what I might have had, and put away.... Is it not dreadful to admit it? Do you not know that self-contempt is part of the price?... I have no money. I know what you have.... I asked. And it is enough for a man who remains unmarried.... For I cannot 'make things do'; I cannot 'contrive'; I will not cling to the fringe of things, or play that heartbreaking rôle of the shabby expatriated on the Continent.... No person in this world ever had enough. I tell you I could find use for every flake of metal ever mined!... You see you do not know me. From my pretty face and figure you misjudge me. I am intelligent—not intellectual, though I might have been, might even be yet. I am cultivated, not learned; though I care for learning—or might, if I had time.... My rôle in life is to mount to a security too high for any question as to my dominance.... Can you take me there?”
“There are other heights, Sylvia.”
“Higher?”
“Yes, dear.”