‘I suppose you’re all right?’ he said.
‘Oh, I shall be quite all right.’
‘Please forget all about me.’
‘I shan’t forget about you. But I shall forget all this—if you will do the same. We will meet in the future, Roddy, won’t we?—just as usual,—with all the others?’
‘I think it would be better not to. I think we’d better not write to each other or ever meet again.’
‘Not ever meet again, Roddy?’ How did he come to be master of such cold decisions? She felt like a child in futile conflict with the fixed and unalterable will of a grown-up person. ‘Why? Why? Why? Please do let me. Please do. I won’t ever be a nuisance again, I promise. You’ve said you liked me. Oh, I must see you! If I can’t see you, I can’t ever see any of them again. Don’t you see? And then I’d have nothing.... You wouldn’t tell them, would you, Roddy? Please let me see you again.’
It had lasted too long. In another moment she would be on her knees to him, hysterical, loathsome.
A nervous quiver of his lips checked her suddenly and made her quiet. In some obscure way he was suffering too. He looked like the little boy whose face had implored her not to cry that time of the rabbit’s death. Yes, the spectacle of other people’s pain had always affected him unpleasantly.
‘It’s all right, Roddy,’ she said. ‘Don’t worry about me. I’ll get on without you.’
‘I’m not worth wasting one moment’s regret on,’ he said, almost earnestly. ‘Believe me, Judith. It’s true.’ He looked at her for the last time. ‘I can only say again I’m very sorry and ask you to forget all about it.’