Marcia straightened sudden. He met the attack of her gesture.
“Now listen, do you hear?”
She stayed balanced, looking at him straight: her eyes filled with an ironic hunger. So Tom wanted her. He began before she changed.
“You have never understood me, Marcia. I can’t blame you. I have never understood myself. I am honest with you. I have always been. Perhaps it was expecting too much, dear, that you should be able to stand that.... Marcia, I care for you now, as I did before, more than for any woman in the world.”
She dropped her eyes and began to finger the embroidery of her chair.
“I go through strange tides, Marcia. I cannot help that. Most men have hypocrisy to hide these ebbs. Most women have passiveness. I have neither. So I suffer.... Marcia,” he went on, “I do not want to lose you. But also I do not want to hurt you. Can’t I have you, without hurting you, Marcia! It was because I had not answered that question, that I forced myself away, forced myself cool.”
“What do you mean, Tom?”
He took a chair and brought it beside hers and seated himself. With a great calm he heard himself say:
“Marcia—will you marry me?”
“I should love to, Tom.”