Page:Embarrassments (New York, The Macmillan Company, 1897).djvu/291

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THE WAY IT CAME
279

I really think it was this peculiar diffidence that finally controlled the situation. I mean that if they had failed for the first year or two because they couldn't help it they kept up the habit because they had—what shall I call it?—grown nervous. It really took some lurking volition to account for anything so absurd.