“Tell me one,” she said.
“I will give you my favorite. You are not what you seem to be—not less but more than you pretend to be. You have been tenderly reared and much loved. You are not here earning your bread because of necessity, but for some purpose not thought of by those with whom you come in contact. Having demonstrated your ability to stand alone, you will go back home some day and be done with it. You are supported in whatever otherwise would be hard, by the knowledge that you are free to turn your back upon it whenever you wish. Am I not a good clairvoyant?”
“Permit me to ask why you think as you do about me?”
“Because you give me the impression of not belonging where I find you. You seem to be playing a part and doing it with exceeding skill; but your real self is not in it. As you say, you will be gone some day to your own people. And now that I have confessed myself a failure and a fool, I too, shall go away.”
“Why?” she asked, regretfully. “Why must the men and women who find each other companionable be lovers or nothing to each other? I am fond of you, very, not in the sentimental fashion, but as good comrade and friend. Why can’t we go on just as we have been doing? That talk about loving me need make no difference.”
“You are like a child about these things,” he said. “You know not the creature man in his bondage to selfishness. You credit us with the strength of gods, and we are mostly such poor, ill-developed wretches that if we want what we cannot have we must run away to avoid showing how little we are masters of ourselves. But tell me what are you going to do with your life?”
“I have my dreams.”
“Of what?”
“Happiness.”
“Would it be offensive if I asked upon what particular brand of the article you have set your heart?”