His voice was very calm and full of feeling; and she, also grown calmer, answered:
"You feel for her."
"I do."
"Well, then . . ."
"But you have no right to bring that up against me. I don't grant you that right . . . because, Tilly . . ."
"Right, right? What rights have I? I have no rights! . . . I live in your house on sufferance. . . ."
"Tilly, be careful!"
"Why should I?"
"You're destroying our happiness."
"It doesn't exist."
"Yes, it does . . . if . . ."
He passed his hand over his head. There was a cold wind blowing; and the beads of perspiration stood on his forehead.
"If you would be reasonable."
"And share you?"
"Share me? . . . With whom?" he roared.
"Not with her, perhaps," she resumed, frightened, "but with . . . with . . ."
"With whom?"
"With them all."
"All whom?"
"Your family . . . all of them . . . whom you love more than me."
"I don't love them more."
"No, but you feel with them . . . and not with me."
"Then feel with me!" he implored, as though to save both her and himself. "Feel, Tilly, that I can't be a fashionable doctor, but that I have a large practice, a number of patients to whom I am of use."
