ng--not merely with my mouth. And if I
sighed, it was because I tried to give him more--more than I had--and
failed. Ah! The sensation of his nearness, the warmth of his face, the
titillation of his hair, the slow, luxurious intake of our breaths, the
sweet cruelty of his desperate clutch on my shoulders, the glimpses of
his skin through my eyelashes when I raised ever so little my eyelids!
Pain and joy of life, you were mingled then!

I remembered that I was a woman, and disengaged myself and withdrew from
him. I hated to do it; but I did it. We became self-conscious. The
brilliant and empty drawing-room scanned us unfavourably with all its
globes and mirrors. How difficult it is to be natural in a great crisis!
Our spirits clamoured for expression, beating vainly against a thousand
barred doors of speech. There was so much to say, to explain, to define,
and everything was so confused and dizzily revolving, that we knew not
which door to open first. And then I think we both felt, but I more than
he, that explanations and statements were futile, that even if all the
doors were thrown open together, they would be inadequate. The
deliciousness of silence, of wonder, of timidity, of things guessed at
and hidden....

'It makes me afraid,' he murmured at length.

'What?'

'To be loved like that.... Your kiss ... you don't know.'

I smiled almost sadly. As if I did not know what my kiss had done! As if
I did not know that my kiss had created between us the happiness which
brings ruin!

'You _do_ love me?' he demanded.

I nodded, and sat down.

'Say it, say it!' he pleaded.

'More than I can ever show you,' I said proudly.

'Honestly,' he said, 'I can't imagine what you have been able to see in
me. I'm nothing--I'm nobody--'

'Foolish boy!' I exclaimed. 'You are you.'

The profound significance of that age-worn phrase struck me for the
first time.

He rushed to me at the word 'boy,' and, standing over me, took my hand in
his hot hand. I let it lie, inert.

'But you haven't always loved me. I have always loved _you_, from the
moment when I drove with you, that first day, from the office to your
hotel. But you haven't always loved me.'

'No,' I admitted.

'Then when did you--? Tell me.'

'I was dull at first--I could not see. But when you told me that the end
of _Fate and Friendship_ was not as good as I could make it--do you
remember, that afternoon in the office?--and how reluctant you were to
tell me,