"If we get any closer you'll see the chinks in my armour. I suppose I'll
see little dark patches in your shine.... If you didn't think so well of
me, I suppose I should just let Louis drop out--if I didn't think so
well of you I'd give you the kisses and narcotics and seduction you're
tired of."
"Marcella, I don't care--if I thought--" he began, almost savagely.
"Oh, thoughts, thoughts! They're cruel! Here we both are, thinking so
much better than we can do. No--no! We _can_ do it! Only--we can't do it
happily. Some day, I think, shining thinking and shining doing will be
hand in hand--"
She stood up slowly then, and turned away. He saw her going right out of
his life. And it seemed to him just as it had seemed to her, that all he
had ever done or had done to him had led up to that moment.
"Marcella," he cried, and seized her hands again. "I can't let you go.
Whatever you have, whatever you are, I want you."
"I!" she cried. "I! Always I! What do you and I and any of us matter,
really? What does it matter if we do get smashed up like this if only we
manage to keep our thoughts of each other clean and free from slinking
things--fears, and greeds?"
"I can't _help_ thinking about you!" he cried.
"I know. I can't, either. That's why we've to be so careful _what_ we
think. And it's going to be a hard, austere sort of thing for us both.
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