"Are you speaking seriously?" he asked.
"Quite seriously. I never did anything that was so serious."
"And that is what you want my opinion about?" he asked. "If so, you
must tell me more, Mike. I can't have an opinion unless you give me the
reasons why you did it. The thing itself--well, the thing itself doesn't
seem to matter so immensely. The significance of it is why you did it."
Michael's big, heavy-browed face lightened a moment. "For a fellow who
never thinks," he said, "you think uncommonly well. But the reasons are
obvious enough. You can guess sufficient reasons to account for it."
"Let's hear them anyhow," said Francis.
Michael clouded again.
"Surely they are obvious," he said. "No one knows better than me, unless
it is you, that I'm not like the rest of you. My mind isn't the build of
a guardsman's mind, any more than my unfortunate body is. Half our work,
as you know quite well, consists in being pleasant and in liking it.
Well, I'm not pleasant. I'm not breezy and cordial. I can't do it.
I make a task of what is a pastime to all of you, and I only shuffle
through my task. I'm not popular, I'm not liked. It's no earthly use
saying I am. I don't like the life; it seems to me senseless.
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