Page:Sorrell and Son - Deeping - 1926.djvu/352

 asking quite different things of it. Even the language each spoke had a strangeness for the other. Kit's directness was a hurtling spear; she, with an almost equal directness, put up an implacable bright shield, and thrust from behind it with a sword. She was infinitely more clever than he was, swifter, more temperamental, more subtle. He made her think of a big, strong, blundering, generous thing, poignantly male, capable of supreme tendernesses and of exasperating exactions. It was not that he was obvious, or that there were whole spaces of life that he did not understand, mere lacune in the male brain. He understood a part of her only too well. The trouble was that he did not or would not understand the part of her that mattered to herself.

"What do you want with that shop?"

She told him.

"Independence."

"But with your books. You are much better off than I am. A flat in town—and a bungalow at Marley."

"You interfering devil."

Interference may be flattering, but there were times when she lost her temper with him, or pretended to lose it, and said things to him that she thought were unforgivable. And he had a way of turning rather white, and of smiling at her, and of betraying to her another side of himself. If she hurt him he would not show it.

"Well—if I do interfere, it's because I care rather damnably—and you know it."

"Does caring give you the right to talk like a bishop?"

"Your view of life and mine don't tally."

"Well—well! You missionary! Take Bibles to the Chinese. Do you think I am to correct my way of life?"

"Molly!"

"Be quiet. The old bird in the cage idea. What an obsolete creature you are—my dear."

"I'm old fashioned."

"Don't say that. It's such humbug."

"I can't help it. Besides, it isn't humbug. Nobody in these days says 'I love you.' Why is it? Are we too squeamish, and self conscious and self critical? Or is it betause we don't believe?"

"I don't believe."