neither here nor there, now.  You may think I’m offering myself as a sort of vicarious atonement—­if your Doris fails you—­but I’m not, really.  I’m too selfish.  I have never sacrificed myself for any man.  I never will.  It isn’t in me.  I’m just as eager to get all I can out of life as I ever was.  I liked you long ago.  I like you still.  That’s all there is to it, Robin.”

She shifted herself nearer him.  She put one hand on his shoulder, the other on his knee, and bent forward, peering into his face.  Hollister matched that questioning gaze for a second.  It was unreadable.  It conveyed no message, hinted nothing, held no covert suggestion.  It was earnest and troubled.  He had never before seen that sort of look on Myra’s face.  He could make nothing of it, and so there was nothing in it to disturb him.  But the warm pressure of her hands, the nearness of her body, did trouble him.  He put her hands gently away.

“You shouldn’t come here,” he said quietly.  “I will call a spade a spade.  I love Doris—­and I have a queer, hungry sort of feeling about the boy.  If it happens that in spite of our life together Doris can’t bear me and can’t get used to me, if it becomes impossible for us to go on together—­well, I can’t make clear to you the way I feel about this.  But I’m afraid.  And if it turns out that I’m afraid with good cause—­why, I don’t know what I’ll do, what way I’ll turn.  But wait until that happens—­Well, it seems that a man and a woman who have loved and lived together can’t become completely indifferent—­they must either hate and despise each other—­or else—­You understand?  We have made some precious blunders, you and I. We have involved other people in our blundering, and we mustn’t forget about these other people.  I can’t.  Doris and the kid come first—­myself last.  I’m selfish too.  I can only sit here in suspense and wait for things to happen as they will.  You,” he hesitated a second, “you can’t help me, Myra.  You could hurt me a lot if you tried—­and yourself too.”

“I see,” she said.  “I understand.”

She sat for a time with her hands resting in her lap, looking down at the ground.  Then she rose.

“I don’t want to hurt you, Robin,” she said soberly.  “I can’t help looking for a way out, that’s all.  For myself, I must find a way out.  The life I lead now is stifling me—­and I can’t see where it will ever be any different, any better.  I’ve become cursed with the twin devils of analysis and introspection.  I don’t love Jim; I tolerate him.  One can’t go through life merely tolerating one’s husband, and the sort of friends and the sort of existence that appeals to one’s husband, unless one is utterly ox-like—­and I’m not.  Women have lived with men they cared nothing for since the beginning of time, I suppose, because of various reasons—­but I see no reason why I should.  I’m a rebel—­in full revolt against shams and stupidity and ignorance, because those three