how much it means to me to see you
every day."

"I like it, or I wouldn't do it."

"But--I wonder if it means anything to you?"

Curiously enough, with the mere putting it into words, his feeling for
her seemed to grow. He was even somewhat excited. He bent toward her,
his eyes on her face, and caught one of her gloved hands. He was no
longer flirting with a pretty woman. He was in real earnest. But Natalie
was still flirting.

"Do you want to know why I like to be with you? Because of course I do,
or I shouldn't be."

"Does a famishing man want water?"

"Because you are sane and sensible. You believe, as I do, in going on
as normally as possible. All these people who go around glooming because
there is a war across the Atlantic! They are so tiresome. Good heavens,
the hysterical attitude of some women! And Clay!"

He released her hand.

"So you like me because I'm sensible! Thanks."

"That's a good reason, isn't it?"

"Good God, Natalie, I'm only sensible because I have to be. Not about
the war. I'm not talking about that. About you."

"What have I got to do with your being sensible and sane?"

"Just think about things, and you'll know."

She was greatly thrilled and quite untouched. It was a pleasant little
game, and she held all the winning cards. So she said, very softly:

"We mustn't go on like this, you know. We mustn't spoil things."

And by her very "we" let him understand that the plight was not his but
theirs. They were to suffer on, she implied, in a mutual, unacknowledged
passion. He flushed deeply.

But although he was profoundly affected, his infatuation was as spurious
as her pretense of one. He was a dilettante in love, as he was in
art. His aesthetic sense, which would have died of an honest passion,
fattened on the very hopelessness of his beginning an affair with
Natalie. Confronted just then with the privilege of marrying her, he
would have drawn back in dismay.

Since no such privilege was to be his, however, he found a deep
satisfaction in considering himself hopelessly in love with her. He was
profoundly sorry for himself. He saw himself a tragic figure, hopeless
and wretched. He longed for the unattainable; he held up empty hands to
the stars, and by so mimicking the gesture of youth, he regained youth.

"You won't cut me out of your life, Natalie?" he asked wistfully.

And Natalie, who would not have sacrificed this new thrill for anything
real in the world, replied: