'Ah! For what it has witnessed--for what it has witnessed.' He sighed.
'Suppose we discuss something else.'

You must remember my youth, my inexperience, my lack of adroitness in
social intercourse. I talked quietly and slowly, like my aunt, and I know
that I had a tremendous air of sagacity and self-possession; but beneath
that my brain and heart were whirling, bewildered in a delicious,
dazzling haze of novel sensations. It was not I who spoke, but a new
being, excessively perturbed into a consciousness of new powers. I said:

'You say you are friendless, but I wonder how many women are dying for
love of you.'

He started. There was a pause. I felt myself blushing.

'Let me guess at your history,' he said. 'You have lived much alone with
your thoughts, and you have read a great deal of the finest romantic
poetry, and you have been silent, especially with men. You have seen
little of men.'

'But I understand them,' I answered boldly.

'I believe you do,' he admitted; and he laughed. 'So I needn't explain to
you that a thousand women dying of love for one man will not help that
man to happiness, unless he is dying of love for the thousand and first.'

'And have you never loved?'

The words came of themselves out of my mouth.