Newsome's profundity, the shaft thus sunk might well have a reach;
but he wasn't without a resigned apprehension that, at such a rate
of confidence between the two women, he was likely soon to be moved
to show how already, at moments, it had been for him as if he were
dealing directly with Mrs. Newsome. Sarah, to a certainty, would
have begun herself to feel it in him--and this naturally put it in
her power to torment him the more. From the moment she knew he
COULD be tormented--!
"But WHY can you be?"--his companion was surprised at his use of
the word.
"Because I'm made so--I think of everything."
"Ah one must never do that," she smiled. "One must think of as few
things as possible."
"Then," he answered, "one must pick them out right. But all I mean
is--for I express myself with violence--that she's in a position to
watch me. There's an element of suspense for me, and she can see me
wriggle. But my wriggling doesn't matter," he pursued. "I can bear
it. Besides, I shall wriggle out."
The picture at any rate stirred in her an appreciation that he felt
to be sincere. "I don't see how a man can be kinder to a woman than
you are to me."
Well, kind was what he wanted to be; yet even while her charming
eyes rested on him with the truth of this he none the less had his
humour of honesty.
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