"Why couldn't I go on sleepwalking through life? If I had never known you, how much anguish I'd have missed. Oh, my poor dear."
"You mustn't talk to her like that," said Martin. "This is Joyce, she thinks once is enough. She isn't like Phyllis."
"Go away, Martin," called Bunny. "It's no use now."
George held her fiercely. His voice trembled on broken words of tenderness. His bewildered mind craved the ease of words, a little peace, a little resting time. Must this glory of desire be carried for ever secret in his heart?
"You'll hurt her," said Martin angrily.
This they had stumbled on, George's heart cried to him. It was none of their seeking. She belongs to who can understand her, insisted the sweet sophistries of blood. Joyce leaned up to him, the dear backward curve of woman yearning to the face of her dream.
"Don't you know me?" Martin appealed to her. "You gave me the mouse yesterday."
He was unheeded. They did not even know he was there.
"You're doing it too," he said to her bitterly, and went away.
