“Of course,” the girl answered, with a sigh. “Isn’t disappointment always fragmentary?” she asked, sadly.
“How do you mean?”
“Why, happiness is like something complete; and disappointment like something broken off, to me. A story that ends well seems rounded; and one that ends badly leaves you waiting, as you do just after some one dies.”
“Is that why you didn’t like my story?” Ray asked, imprudently. He added quickly, at an embarrassment which came into her face, “Oh, I didn’t mean to add to my offence! I came here partly to excuse it. I was too persistent the other night.”
“Oh, no!”
“Yes, I was. I had no right to an opinion from you. I knew it at the time, but I couldn’t help it. You were right to refuse. But you can tell me how my poem strikes you. It isn’t offered for publication!”
He hoped that she would praise some passages that he thought fine; but she began to speak of the motive, and he saw that she had not missed anything, that she had perfectly seized his intention. She talked to him of it as if it were the work of some one else, and he said impulsively, “If I had you to criticise my actions beforehand, I should not be so apt to make a fool of myself.”
Mrs. Denton came back. “I ran off toward the last. I didn’t want to be here when Peace began to criticise. She’s so severe.”
“She hasn’t been at all severe this time,” said Ray.
“I don’t see how she could be,” Mrs. Denton returned. “All that I heard was splendid.”