Marie shook her head.
"I don't think so! I think I should like you better! Sometimes now I've got the feeling that you're not really natural with me. No, no, I don't think I quite mean that either! It's so difficult to explain, but sometimes it seems as if—almost as if you were—were trying to keep me at arm's length," she explained haltingly.
"You imagine things," Feathers said.
"I don't think so," she answered quietly. "I know I'm not much of a 159 judge of character or anything like that, but since we've been such friends I've thought about you a good deal, and——"
"I am indeed honored."
She flushed sensitively.
"There! That's what I mean—when you say things like that! It isn't really you that's saying it, is it? I mean—you're not saying what you would really like to say." She laughed nervously. "I explain myself very badly, don't I? But I know in my heart what I mean, really I do."
There was a little silence, then Feathers said gently:
"Don't trouble about me, Mrs. Lawless! I'm not at all a mysterious person, as you seem to be imagining. I'm just an ordinary man—as selfish as most of 'em, and no better than the worst; but . . . but I'm very grateful that you've taken me for a friend."
"Chris asked in his last letter if I'd seen you."