"D'you know what I mean?" demanded Pat, who didn't clearly know herself.
"Perfectly."
"What?"
"Coquetry. That's a form of dishonesty between us. And between us there is no reason nor place for anything but honesty."
She came to him then, encircled him closely, drew her lips from his, after a time, to murmur: "You understand me so. When you say things like that I'm crazy about you."
Against his better judgment he said: "I wonder how much you really care for me, Pat?"
"Oh, an awful lot! Or I wouldn't be acting like this. But," she added with pensive frankness, "I've been just as crazy about other people before."
"I see. It's the normal thing for you to feel this way toward someone."
"Oh, well; you expect to have somebody in love with you," she explained. "Think how lost you'd feel without it. And it's natural to play back, isn't it? Now I've hurt you." She spoke the words with a kind of remorseful interest as an experimentalist might feel pity for the animal under his knife.
"That doesn't matter. One gets used to being hurt."