“So does every one. The one thing just makes the difference. It’s the one thing we can’t possibly get.”
“It is n’t what you imagine,” said Yvonne. “You are thinking of money and all that.”
“No. It’s your voice.”
“It is n’t!” cried Yvonne, with a touch of petulant earnestness. “It is to see you bright and happy—as you used to be long, long ago. You might have known.”
“It is very dear of you,” he answered, after a pause. “I am selfish—and can’t understand your sweet spirit. Sometimes I seem to have a stone heart, like the man in the German story.”
“You have a warm, generous heart, Stephen. What other man would have done what you have for me?”
“It was pure selfishness on my part,” he replied. “The loneliness was too appalling. And then, further, I am never quite sure I have acted rightly by you.”
“I am,” she said. “And I’m the best judge, I think.”
But Joyce was correct in his bitter self-analysis. Now and then his sensitive fibres vibrated. But generally the weight of the past years was on his heart, and repressed continuous emotion. To live on these intimate terms with Yvonne and never consider the possibility of loving her, after the way of men, was absurd. The chivalrous instincts awakened by her implicit trust in him, and the double barrier which forbade a love that could result in marriage, made him dismiss such considerations. But often, in gloomy introspective moods, his self-contempt denied these instincts as arrogant pretensions, and attributed the absence of warmer feelings towards Yvonne to the petrifaction of all emotional chords. Of late, however, he had ceased to speculate, taking his insensibility for granted.
When they arrived at the Regent’s Park, they proceeded for some distance northwards up the great avenue. It was crowded. Joyce looked about him, with a fidgeted air, at the stream of passers-by.