to the inevitable.

"You have been thinking?" Maine went on.

"Yes. What a sad occupation that is sometimes--like knitting, or
listening to church-bells at night!"

"Eve, let us be serious."

"God knows I am," she answered. "But modern gravity is dressed in
flippancy. No feeling must go quite naked."

"Don't talk like that," he said. "As there is a nudity in art that may
be beautiful, so there is a nudity in expression, in words, that may be
beautiful. Eve, I have come to hear you tell me something. You know
that." He glanced into her face with an anxiety that she did not fully
understand. Then he said: "Tell it me."

"There is--is so much to tell," she said.

"Yes, yes."

"He does not understand," she thought.

He thought, "She does not understand."

"And I am not good at telling stories."

"Then tell me the truth."

She tried to smile, but she was trembling. "Of course. Why should I
not?" She hesitated, and then added, with a forced attempt at petulance,
"But there is nothing so awkward as giving people more than they expect.
Is there?"

He understood her question, despite its apparent inconsequence, and his
heart quickened its beating: "Give me everything."

"I suppose I should be doing that if I gave you myself," she said
nervously.

"You know best," he answered; and for a moment she was puzzled by not
catching the affirmative for which she had angled.

"Do you want me very, very much?" she asked.

"So much that, as I told you yesterday, I could not ask for you twice.
Don't you understand?"

"Yes. I could not marry a man who had bothered me to be his wife. One
might as well be scolded into virtue. You want me, then, Hugh, and I
want you. But--"

Again she stopped, with sentences fluttering, as it seemed, on the very
edges of her lips. Her heart was at such fearful odds with her
conscience, that she felt as if he must hear the clashing of the swords.
And he did hear it. He would fain have cheered on both the combatants.
Which did he wish should be the conqueror? He hardly knew.

"Yes?" he said.

"It is always so difficult to finish a sentence that begins with 'but,'"
she began; and for the first time her voice sounded tremulous. "When two
people want each other very much, there is always something that ought
to keep them apart--at least, I think so. God must love solitude; it is
His gift to so many." There were tears in her eyes.

"Why should we keep apart, Eve?"

"Because we should b