" He looked down into the fire. "Times
like the last three weeks will come again--must come again;
they are inevitable. When they do come, you must shut your
eyes--you must blind yourself. You must ignore them--and me.
Is it a compact?" He still avoided her eyes.
She turned to him quietly. "Yes--if you wish it," she said,
below her breath.
He was conscious of her glance, but he dared not meet it. He
felt sick at the part he was playing, yet he held to it
tenaciously.
"I wonder if you could do what few men and fewer women are
capable of?" he asked, at last. "I wonder if you could learn
to live in the present?" He lifted his head slowly and met
her eyes. "This is an--an experiment," he went on. "And,
like all experiments, it has good phases and bad. When the
bad phases come round I--I want you to tell yourself that you
are not altogether alone in your unhappiness--that I am
suffering too--in another way."
There was silence when he had spoken, and for a space it
seemed that Eve would make no response.
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