Page:Nalkowska - Kobiety (Women).djvu/281

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A Canticle of Love
269

were fixed steadfastly on my face all the while.

"Well, I see you are far more of a woman than I had ever thought you."

My answer to these words of Stephen's was only a look, but a look of triumph. At last it had come—this, the hardest of all victories to win! … Unfortunately, it came too late. …

"In a few years," he added, "when all your faculties are duly balanced, you will be an exceptional being. Perhaps a model 'Woman of the Future.'"

"Oh, anything but that. I take no interest except in what goes on within me. If I am at all elated, it is not on account of what is there, but of the fact that these forces are incessantly in conflict with my will. I am proud of my imperfections which turn to perfections, of my ideas which treat one another with mutual contempt, of my instincts, so strongly opposed to my logic; of my atavistic tendencies, which it is a finer and more momentous work to unearth and to note down than to put into practice. I am proud of the eternal Becoming, teeming with riches, dazzling with the wildest hues, deafening with harsh discordancies, rushing on, moving