He laughed and looked at her. At heart, as she said, she had no desire to leave Christophe at present: if he irritated her and often bored her she knew the worth of such devotion as his: and she loved no one else. She talked so for fun, partly because she knew he disliked it, partly because she took pleasure in playing with equivocal and unclean thoughts like a child which delights to mess about with dirty water. He knew this. He did not mind. But he was tired of these unwholesome discussions, of the silent struggle against this uncertain and uneasy creature whom he loved, who perhaps loved him: he was tired from the effort that he had to make to deceive himself about her, sometimes tired almost to tears. He would think: "Why, why is she like this? Why are people like this? How second-rate life is!"... At the same time he would smile as he saw her pretty face above him, her blue eyes, her flower-like complexion, her laughing, chattering lips, foolish a little, half open to reveal the brilliance of her tongue and her white teeth. Their lips would almost touch: and he would look at her as from a distance, a great distance, as from another world: he would see her going farther and farther from him, vanishing in a mist.... And then he would lose sight of her. He could hear her no more. He would fall into a sort of smiling oblivion, in which he thought of his music, his dreams, a thousand things foreign, to Ada.... Ah! beautiful music!... so sad, so mortally sad! and yet kind, loving.... Ah! how good it is!... It is that, it is that.... Nothing else is true.... She would shake his arm. A voice would cry: "Eh, what's the matter with you? You are mad, quite mad. Why do you look at me like that? Why don't you answer?" Once more he would see the eyes looking at him. Who was it?... Ah! yes.... He would sigh. She would watch him. She would try to discover what he was thinking of. She did not understand: but she felt that it was useless: that she could not keep hold of him, that there was always a door by which he could escape. She would conceal her irritation. "Why are you crying?" she asked him once as he returned from one of his strange journeys into another life. He drew his hands across his eyes. He felt that they were wet. "I do not know," he said. "Why don't you answer? Three times you have said the same thing." "What do you want?" he asked gently. She went back to her absurd discussions. He waved his hand wearily. "Yes," she said. "I've done. Only a word more!" And off she started again. Christophe shook himself angrily. "Will you keep your dirtiness to yourself!" "I was only joking." "Find cleaner subjects, then!" "Tell me why, then. Tell me why you don't like it." "Why? You can't argue as to why a dump-heap smells. It does smell, and that is all! I hold my nose and go away." He went away, furious: and he strode along taking in great breaths of the cold air.