children. Women have been acting that all down the ages, and yet I have to scream and yell and fight to make anyone take any notice of me. And you who have been all round the world, I have to shout it at you. Will you understand me? I’m not domestic. I do not want to darn your socks. I do not want to put your slippers by the fire. I do not want to put buttons on your shirts. I do not want children. I’m probably a horrid unnatural brute, but I did not make myself, and I can’t make myself like the women who want to do these things. I do want to love you. I do want to play the piano to you. I do want to talk to you. I do want to rest you. I do want to help you to forget the things in life you don’t like. And I do want—I do want—to take—some of the pain out of your eyes ———” Her voice broke, and she dropped her head in her hands.
For some seconds the only sound in the night was that of little fishes sporting around them in the shallow water.
Then Dane leaned towards her and kissed her neck and the back of her bowed head.
“Valerie, it’s just because you are what you are that I love you. And we won’t talk any more to-night.”
III
He was sorry to see when he walked into the office on Friday morning that she looked as if she had lain awake a good deal. He had himself in the meanwhile made up his mind that all his powers of persuasion should be used to get her to marry him. Though he despised the marriage ceremony as much as she did for the things it was used to cover he had a wholesome respect for it as a convenience in a crazy world. And he had never had any idea
