"I do not think we ought to take advantage of an accident
like this.... Do you? Besides, probably, in the natural course of social
events----"
"But it may be years! months! weeks!" insisted Brown, losing control of
himself.
"I should hope it would at least be a decently reasonable interval of
several weeks----"
"But I don't know what to do if I never see you again for weeks! I c-care
so much--for--you."
She shrank back in her chair, and in her altered face he read that he had
disgraced himself.
"I knew I was going to," he said in despair. "I couldn't keep it--I
couldn't stop it. And now that you see what sort of a man I am I'm going
to tell you more."
"You need not," she said faintly.
"I must. Listen! I--I don't even know your full name--all I know is that
it is Betty, and that your cat's name is Clarence and your plumber's name
is Quinn. But if I didn't know anything at all concerning you it would
have been the same. I suppose you will think me insane if I tell you that
before the car, on which you rode, came into sight I _knew_ you were on
it. And I--cared--for--you--before I ever saw you."
"I don't understand----"
"I know you don't. _I_ don't. All I understand is that what you and I
have done has been done by us before, sometime, somewhere--part only--
down to--down to where you changed cars. Up to that moment, before you
took the Lexington Avenue car, I recognized each incident as it
occurred.
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