"
"The question is how to keep these two people apart," she struck in. She
had recovered. I admired the quickness of women's wit. Mental agility
is a rare perfection. And aren't they agile! Aren't they--just! And
tenacious! When they once get hold you may uproot the tree but you won't
shake them off the branch. In fact the more you shake . . . But only
look at the charm of contradictory perfections! No wonder men give
in--generally. I won't say I was actually charmed by Mrs. Fyne. I was
not delighted with her. What affected me was not what she displayed but
something which she could not conceal. And that was emotion--nothing
less. The form of her declaration was dry, almost peremptory--but not
its tone. Her voice faltered just the least bit, she smiled faintly; and
as we were looking straight at each other I observed that her eyes were
glistening in a peculiar manner. She was distressed. And indeed that
Mrs. Fyne should have appealed to me at all was in itself the evidence of
her profound distress. "By Jove she's desperate too," I thought. This
discovery was followed by a movement of instinctive shrinking from this
unreasonable and unmasculine affair.
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