“Yes,” she breathed, “I have come to know you.”
“And by this time you know just about the sort of man I am. I must assume that you know that, because I expect you to take all of me into account in what I am going to say. I know I shall say it badly. I doubt if I shall succeed at all in saying even what I mean. Yet, you've got to understand me.”
She kept silent; but it seemed to me, in the subtle understanding we had somehow reached, that she assented to this preliminary condition.
“I am going to put it bluntly,” I rushed on “It's the only way I can say it at all. I see two facts, as regards you and me. One is that you are a wonderful woman. You have great gifts. You have what we call temperament—a silly word, but there is no other for the precise meaning. It is an absurd waste to keep you here. You must go to Berlin or Paris—Paris, I think, for the French music is the most stimulating of any today. You must be prepared for opera just as rapidly as possible. There is no time to lose.”
Her mouth twisted into a fleeting half-smile. “It is quite out of the question,” she murmured.
“No, it is not out of the question!” My voice was rising, and she had to give me a warning look. “I do not know quite how it is to be managed, but I can see a beginning, at least.”
She seemed surprised at this, so I talked more and more rapidly. “First, you must consider my second fact. Remember, I am speaking only as a practical scientist—quite impersonally.” God forgive me, this seemed true at the moment! “What you have done for me has a value that I dare not even estimate. Though my income is not great, even from my text books, I would gladly have traveled thousands of miles and devoted months of work to the securing of the phonographic close-interval scale that now is securely mine.”
She was beginning to stir restlessly. But I would not let her speak. “Take your copying and clerical work alone—perhaps, I should not say this—I could not possibly get such devoted and expert assistance anywhere in the world without paying a reasonable price by the week. Now hear me! You must not close your mind to what I am saying!” For I knew she was doing just that, as women will. I caught her arm—and her hand—in my two hands and clung to her. She did not resist. Nor did she respond—merely looked soberly off over the city, and seemed, all the time, to be drifting away from me. My head was burning hot. My forehead was dripping wet, and I had to shake the drops of sweat out of my eyes. Great, wild thoughts were gripping my mind, that had been so confused. I knew then that I must get her out of Peking, away from that ugly, persistent old man across the hall, away from the drink-crazed younger man who thought he could by a violent act restore what he called his honor. I knew that I must be equal to this task. I must find the way. And I must persuade her.
So I cried—
“You must listen! I will not place you in my debt. But you have placed me in yours. You must be fair to me. You must let me help you by paying my debt to you. I promise you I will do more than that. But oh, you must be fair to me!”