I want to be first with some one again." "You will always be first with me." "Even if I don't marry you ?" "Whatever you do." Like the veriest coquette, she instantly decided to take all and give nothing--to take his interest, his devotion, his loyalty, all of the first degree, and give him in return a divided interest, a loyalty too much infected by humor to be complete, and a devotion in which several causes and Pete took precedence.

She did not do this in ignorance.

On the contrary, she knew just how it would be; that he would wait and she be late, that he would adjust himself and she remain unchanged, that he would give and give and she would never remember that it would be kind some day to ask.

Yet it did not seem to her an unfair bargain, and perhaps she was right.
"I couldn't marry you," she said.

"I couldn't change.