at that moment she
would have welcomed a different attitude in him. If only this problem
of hers could be taken forcefully out of her hands, what a relief it
would be. If only Wally, masterfully insistent, would batter down her
hesitations and _grab_ her, knock her on the head and carry her off
like a caveman, care less about her happiness and concentrate on his
own, what a solution it would be.... But then he wouldn't be Wally....
Nevertheless, Jill gave a little sigh. Her new life had changed her
already. It had blunted the sharp edge of her independence. To-night
she was feeling the need of some one to lean on--some one strong and
cosy and sympathetic who would treat her like a little girl and shield
her from all the roughness of life. The fighting spirit had gone out
of her, and she was no longer the little warrior facing the world with
a brave eye and a tilted chin. She wanted to cry and be petted.

"No!" said Wally again. There had been the faintest suggestion of a
doubt when he had spoken the word before, but now it shot out like a
bullet. "And I'll tell you why. I want _you_--and, if you married me
feeling like that, it wouldn't be you. I want Jill, the whole Jill,
and nothing but Jill, and, if I can't have that, I'd rather not have
anything. Marriage isn't a motion-picture close-up with slow fade-out
on the embrace. It's a partnership, and what's the good of a
partnership if your heart's not in it? It's like collaborating with a
man you dislike.... I believe you wish sometimes--not often, perhaps,
but when you're feeling lonely and miserable--that I would pester and
bludgeon you into marrying me.... What's the matter?"

Jill had started. It was disquieting to have her thoughts read with
such accuracy.

"Nothing," she said.

"It wouldn't be any good," Wally went on, "because it wouldn't be
_me_. I couldn't keep that attitude up, and I know I should hate
myself for ever having tried it. There's nothing in the world I
wouldn't do to help you, though I know it's no use offering to do
anything. You're a fighter, and you mean to fight your own battle. It
might happen that, if I kept after you and badgered you and nagged
you, one of these days, when you were feeling particularly all alone
in the world and tired of fighting for yourself, you might consent to
marry me. But it wouldn't do. Even if you reconciled yourself to it,
it wouldn't do. I suppose the cave-woman sometimes felt rather
relieved when everything