I will prove it to you again by showing you how impossible is the part
which I play in your romance. I will tell you now, what you doubtless do
not know, that I am engaged to be married to the best woman in all the
earth, excepting your own good wife, of course."

"Is that a fact?" asked the doctor. "And do you love her?"

"To be sure I do. I love her very dearly, and if I ever see her again I
shall tell her so in a manner to make her understand it."

"Why, doesn't she understand it now?"

"Yes, I think so, but she thought I didn't show heart enough in my
wooing."

"Well, if she could see you with Mona she would learn that you have plenty
of heart when the right one appears to make it spring into life."

"You speak as if you thought I did not love Margaret. You do not know her.
Why, I wouldn't once look at another woman anywhere, not even in Mars, and
most certainly not in that puckered-up old world that we have just left,
happily for us."

"Do you know what I think about you?" asked the doctor.

"No."

"I think you have an exceedingly poor memory. First, you forgot Margaret
as soon as the voice of that fair singer fell on your ear, and now you
have forgotten the singer again the moment we have lost her. I await with