I don't know whether you understand how that can be under the circumstances. But I do.
You're nearer to me intellectually and emotionally than I thought you were.
Don't frown.
You want the truth, don't you?
Well, there you have it.
Now explain me to myself, if you can."
"I don't want to argue with you, Lester," she said softly, laying her hand on his arm.
"I merely want to love you.
I understand quite well how it has all come about.
I'm sorry for myself.
I'm sorry for you.
I'm sorry—" she hesitated—"for Mrs. Kane.
She's a charming woman.
I like her. I really do.
But she isn't the woman for you, Lester; she really isn't.
You need another type.
It seems so unfair for us two to discuss her in this way, but really it isn't.
We all have to stand on our merits.
And I'm satisfied, if the facts in this case were put before her, as you have put them before me, she would see just how it all is, and agree. She can't want to harm you.
Why, Lester, if I were in her position I would let you go. I would, truly.
I think you know that I would.
Any good woman would.
It would hurt me, but I'd do it.
It will hurt her, but she'll do it.
Now, mark you my words, she will.
I think I understand her as well as you do—better—for I am a woman.
Oh," she said, pausing, "I wish I were in a position to talk to her.
I could make her understand."
Lester looked at Letty, wondering at her eagerness.
She was beautiful, magnetic, immensely worth while.
"Not so fast," he repeated.
"I want to think about this.
I have some time yet."
She paused, a little crestfallen but determined.
"This is the time to act," she repeated, her whole soul in her eyes.
She wanted this man, and she was not ashamed to let him see that she wanted him.
"Well, I'll think of it," he said uneasily, then, rather hastily, he bade her good-by and went away.
CHAPTER LI
Lester had thought of his predicament earnestly enough, and he would have been satisfied to act soon if it had not been that one of those disrupting influences which sometimes complicate our affairs entered into his Hyde Park domicile. Gerhardt's health began rapidly to fail.
Little by little he had been obliged to give up his various duties about the place; finally he was obliged to take to his bed.
He lay in his room, devotedly attended by Jennie and visited constantly by Vesta, and occasionally by Lester.
There was a window not far from his bed, which commanded a charming view of the lawn and one of the surrounding streets, and through this he would gaze by the hour, wondering how the world was getting on without him.
He suspected that Woods, the coachman, was not looking after the horses and harnesses as well as he should, that the newspaper carrier was getting negligent in his delivery of the papers, that the furnace man was wasting coal, or was not giving them enough heat.
A score of little petty worries, which were nevertheless real enough to him.
He knew how a house should be kept.
He was always rigid in his performance of his self-appointed duties, and he was so afraid that things would not go right.
Jennie made for him a most imposing and sumptuous dressing-gown of basted wool, covered with dark-blue silk, and bought him a pair of soft, thick, wool slippers to match, but he did not wear them often.
He preferred to lie in bed, read his Bible and the Lutheran papers, and ask Jennie how things were getting along.
"I want you should go down in the basement and see what that feller is doing.
He's not giving us any heat," he would complain.