I spluttered for words.
"My God! Beatrice!" I cried; "but this is cowardice and folly! Are you
afraid of life? You of all people! What does it matter what has been or
what we were? Here we are with the world before us! Start clean and new
with me. We'll fight it through! I'm not such a simple lover that I'll
not tell you plainly when you go wrong, and fight our difference out
with you. It's the one thing I want, the one thing I need--to have you,
and more of you and more! This love-making--it's love-making. It's just
a part of us, an incident--"
She shook her head and stopped me abruptly. "It's all," she said.
"All!" I protested.
"I'm wiser than you. Wiser beyond words." She turned her eyes to me and
they shone with tears.
"I wouldn't have you say anything--but what you're saying," she said.
"But it's nonsense, dear. You know it's nonsense as you say it."
I tried to keep up the heroic note, but she would not listen to it.
"It's no good," she cried almost petulantly. "This little world has made
us what we are. Don't you see--don't you see what I am? I can make love.
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