"Yes. Li Ho and his kind are the product of forces we
only guess at. I asked a man who had spent twenty years in China if
he had learned to understand the Oriental mind. He said he had
learned more than that, he had learned that the Oriental mind is
beyond understanding. But--aren't we getting away from our subject?
Let's begin all over again. Miss Farr, I have the honor to ask your
hand in marriage."
She was silent for so long a time that the professor had opportunity
to think of many things. And, as he thought, his heart went down--
and down. She would refuse. He knew it. The clean edge of her mind
would cut through all his tangle of words right to the core of the
real issue, And the core of the real issue was not as sound as it
would need to be to satisfy her demands. For in that core still lay
a possibility, the possibility of love. He had not eliminated love.
Many a man has loved after thirty-five. Many a girl who has sworn--
but no, she would not admit this possibility in her own case. It was
only in his case that she would recognize it. She would see the weak
spot there.... She would refuse. He could feel refusal gathering in
her heart. And his own heart beat hotly in his throat. For if this
failed, what other way was left? Yet to go and leave her here, alone
in that rotting cottage on the hill. . .. the prey of any ghastly
fate.... no, it couldn't be done. He must convince her. He must.
"My friend," said Desire (he loved her odd, old-fashioned way of
calling him "my friend"), "I admit that you have tempted me.
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