But if you'd only left things as they were, and let us all go, and
other people come--"
"That's just it," he said. "I'm told it's the bad season and nobody else
would come until Lent. And, anyhow, it's not business to let a lot of
people go away mad. It gives the place a black eye."
"Dear me," she said, "how businesslike you are growing!"
He went over close to the stairs and dropped his voice.
"If you want the bitter truth," he went on, trying to smile, "I've put
myself on trial and been convicted of being a fool and a failure. I've
failed regularly and with precision at everything I have tried. I've
been going around so long trying to find a place that I fit into, that
I'm scarred as with many battles. And now I'm on probation--for the last
time. If this doesn't go, I--I--"
"What?" she asked, leaning down to him. "You'll not--"
"Oh, no," he said, "nothing dramatic, of course. I could go around the
country in a buggy selling lightning-rods--"
She drew herself back as if she resented his refusal of her sympathy.
"Or open a saloon in the Philippines!" he finished mockingly. "There's a
living in that."
"You are impossible," she said, and turned away.
Oh, I haven't any excuse to make for him! I think he was just hungry for
her sympathy and her respect, knowing nothing else was coming to him.
But the minute they grew a bit friendly he seemed to remember the
prince, and that, according to his idea of it, she was selling herself,
and he would draw off and look at her in a mocking unhappy way that made
me want to slap him.
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