Page:The Tragic Muse (London & New York, Macmillan & Co., 1890), Volume 1.djvu/157

Rh that would be too banal. But if I'm bad—and I know I'm dreadful—I wish you would talk to me about it."

"It's delightful to talk to you," Sherringham said.

"No, it isn't, but it's kind," she answered, looking away from him.

Her voice had a quality, as she uttered these words, which made him exclaim, "Every now and then you say something—!"

She turned her eyes back to him, smiling. "I don't want it to come by accident." Then she added: "If there's any good to be got from trying, from showing one's self, how can it come unless one hears the simple truth, the truth that turns one inside out? It's all for that—to know what one is, if one's a stick! "

"You have great courage, you have rare qualities," said Sherringham. She had begun to touch him, to seem different: he was glad she had not gone.

For a moment she made no response to this, putting down her empty cup and looking vaguely over the table, as if to select something more to eat. Suddenly she raised her head and broke out with vehemence: "I will, I will, I will!"

"You'll do what you want, evidently."

"I will succeed—I will be great. Of course I know too little, I've seen too little. But I've always liked it; I've never liked anything else. I used to learn things, and to do scenes, and to rant about the room, when I was five years old." She went on, communicative, persuasive, familiar, egotistical (as was necessary), and slightly common, or perhaps only natural; with reminiscences, reasons and anecdotes, an unexpected