"I've been pretty cut up about it all," he admitted. "But there's no
doubt it's for the best. As I look back on it, I see she never was
comfortable in her mind. On and off, hot and cold--and I took it for
flightiness. The light broke in on me, all of a sudden, when that dirty
yellow rascal began to talk. But if you'll believe me, sir, I used to be
jealous of Follet. Think of it, now." He began to whittle.
Evidently her ravings to Madame Mauer had not yet come to his ears.
Madame Mauer was capable of holding her tongue; and there was a chance
Follet might hold his. At all events, I would not tell Stires how
seriously she had loved him. He was a very provincial person, and I
think--considering her pedigree--it would have shocked him.
French Eva's cerebrations are in some ways a mystery to me, but I am
sure she knew what she wanted. I fancy she thought--but, as I say, I do
not know--that the mode of her passing would at least make all clear to
Stires. Perhaps she hoped for tardy regrets on his part; an
ex-post-facto decision that it didn't matter. The hot-and-cold business
had probably been the poor girl's sense of honor working--though,
naturally, she couldn't have known (on Naapu) the peculiar
impregnability of Stires's prejudices. When you stop to think of it,
Stires and his prejudices had no business in such a place, and nothing
in earth or sky or sea could have foretold them to the population of
that landscape.
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