Page:O Genteel Lady! (1926).pdf/174

 was, and hope I never will be the ambling nun you have always insisted in considering me to be, and I...and...' her voice trailed away and she dropped her shining head. He heard her say 'some one else' and something that 'love was not.'

'Some one else, Lanice?'

'Some one else.'

'You mean you love...you will marry?'

'I can't define love any more, except that it wasn't at all like what I thought it would be. I can't marry him. He is married already, and, anyhow, he didn't really want me. I mean, permanently.'

Her voice wavered...'anything...die for him' he thought she said. She twisted her hands and gazed upon the basket of fingers that she had made. She was pale and sad to look upon.

'Tell me plainly about this rascal. Lanice, you mean you love such a man?'

'Yes, I think so. I would have died for him, if he had asked me. I'd have torn out my throat.'

'And he was married?'

'Yes.'

'Such a wicked philanderer should be boiled in oil.'

'No, he was just made that way. If God had not wanted him to behave as he did, he would have made him differently.'

'And you, ma'am, may I ask how you behaved?'

'Yes.'

'Well, then, how did you?'

'There is nothing in the world I would not have done for him.' Her voice shook.