"Because all evening you've been so utterly different."
"But in this weather———"
"No. That wouldn't make you afraid to look at me all evening!"
"But I did look at you. Often."
"No. Not really a look."
"But I'm looking at you now."
"Yes—in the dark!" she said. "No—the weather might make you even quieter than usual, but it wouldn't strike you so nearly dumb. No—and it wouldn't make you seem to be under such a strain-as if you thought only of escape!"
"But I haven't———"
"You shouldn't," she interrupted, gently. "There's nothing you have to escape from, you know. You aren't committed to—to this friendship."
"I'm sorry you think———" he began, but did not complete the fragment.
She took it up. "You're sorry I think you're so different, you mean to say, don't you? Never mind: that's what you did mean to say, but you couldn't finish it because you're not good at deceiving."
"Oh, no," he protested, feebly. "I'm not deceving. "I'm———"
