Page:Margaret Sherwood--A Puritan in Bohemia.djvu/127

A Puritan Bohemia She never existed anyway outside of a story-book. I simply don't like Howard enough—for that."

The two friends were walking slowly through the great deserted rooms.

"How do you know?"

"If I did I should be satisfied. Love is the one thing in which there should be no doubts."

A queer look came into Mrs. Kent's face.

"That is very foolish. Do you mean that you, like the old novel-writers, think of love as one long, untroubled, mutual spasm?"

"I sha'n't tell," answered Anne, laughing.

"'He clasped her in his arms in one long ecstasy' no longer serves as a solution of that problem. Don't let a Fireside Companion ideal keep you from the happiness of your life."

"I've never seen the Fireside Companion," Anne remarked loftily.

"Neither have I," said Mrs. Kent with a smile. "Intellectual women are queer. You are twenty-seven years old, but in