A moralist might have said that at
this point his mind should have been full of self-reproach for the
suffering he had caused. On the contrary, he was extremely angry, with
the confused impotent anger of one who finds himself unreasonably but
efficiently frustrated. He was trapped by the illogicality of human
life. The obstacles in the way of his desire seemed to him purely
artificial, and yet he could see no way of removing them. Mary's
words, the tone of her voice even, angered him, for she would not help
him. She was part of the insanely jumbled muddle of a world which
impedes the sensible life. He would have liked to slam the door or
break the hind legs of a chair, for the obstacles had taken some such
curiously substantial shape in his mind.
"I doubt that one human being ever understands another," he said,
stopping in his march and confronting Mary at a distance of a few
feet.
"Such damned liars as we all are, how can we? But we can try. If you
don't want to marry me, don't; but the position you take up about
love, and not seeing each other--isn't that mere sentimentality? You
think I've behaved very badly," he continued, as she did not speak.
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