Part 55 (1/2)
Ca.s.sy took another bitter-sweet. ”She's that. Any one would know it.”
Lennox bit at the cigar. ”Too good for me, though. So good that she threw me over.”
Ca.s.sy put a finger through it. ”She did not understand. Any girl might have done the same.”
Sombrely Lennox considered her. ”Would you? You say she did not understand. I know well enough she did not. But if you cared for a man, would you throw him over because of a charge which you could not be sure was true and without giving him a chance to disprove it? Would you?”
He could stand on his head, yes, but it was unfair to grill her. She flushed.
”I don't see what that has to do with it.”
”How, you don't see?”
”Isn't it obvious? Miss Austen and I move in different worlds. On any subject our views might differ and I don't mean at all but that hers would be superior.”
”There can be but one view of what's square.”
”I am sure she meant to be.”
Unconcernedly, Lennox smiled. The smile lit his face. From sombre it became radiant.
”That's all very well. The point is what you would think. Would you think it square to throw a man over as she threw me?”
Ca.s.sy showed her teeth. ”If I didn't care for him, certainly I would.”
”But if you did?”
That was too much. Ca.s.sy exclaimed at it. ”If! If! How can I tell? I don't know. I lack experience.”
”But not heart.”
He was right about that, worse luck. How it beat, too! It would kill her though to have him suspect it.
”I do wish you would tell me,” he added.
Ca.s.sy, casting about, felt like an imbecile and said brilliantly: ”Haven't you a match? Shall I fetch one?”
Lennox extracted a little case. ”Thanks. It's an answer I'd like.”
It was enough to drive you mad and again casting about, but not getting it, she hedged.
”It will have to be in the abstract, then.”
”Very good. Let's have it in the abstract.”
Yet even in the abstract! However, with an uplift of the chin that gave her, she felt, an air of discussing a matter in which she had no concern at all, she plunged.
”One never knows, don't you know, but it seems to me that if by any chance I did care for a man--not that it is in the least presumable that I ever shall--but if I did, why, then, no. He couldn't get rid of me, not unless he tried very hard, but if he didn't, then no matter what I heard, no matter how true it might be, I would cling to his coat-tails, that is, if he wore them, and if, also, he cared for a ninny like me.”
Ca.s.sy paused, shook her docked hair and solemnly resumed: ”Which, of course, he couldn't.”
”I knew you would say that.”