"Of course not. Why should I have come?" He set the basket down. "Hands all grimy. Why should you! God, I don't know. I'm going to love you." He swung her hands in his delightedly, but there was something stealthy and embarrassed in his manner. He could not bring himself to kiss her. "At least you're not going to try to make a new man of me!" "I know my limitations." "You haven't any, darling." Julia's mouth was happy, but her eyes were dark and unkind. "It makes one uncomfortable to be thought too well of." She knew that she was about to give herself to him and resented his confidence. He was a crude childlike man. At the same time, she sensed a simplicity in him that was almost noble. Her self-esteem could not endure thinking of a possible debt to him. "Shall we go in?" He opened the door and went in ahead of her. The place was crowded with camp beds, piled one on top of the other, and numbers of more or less dilapidated chairs. There was a thick coating of dust over everything, and films of spider web across the window panes yellowed the light. "Isn't this a disgrace, child? I ought to have had a house-cleaning before we came out." "I like work. We'll clean up together." She removed her hat and laid it on a table. Charles took off his coat. He found an old broom, swept up the trash that littered the floor, and began to pull the furniture into place. Julia discovered a torn shirt and used it to clean the window glass. Charles felt the morning was passing grotesquely. I love her. What shall I do! "Jove, I wish we lived here!" he said. When he had laid a fire in the stone chimney, he pulled out one of the camp beds and made a divan with blankets and pillows. "Come sit down here and warm yourself, child." He turned his back to her and began warming his hands. "It's damp in here." Julia came to the fire. She did not seat herself. He knew she was beside him. He put off the moment when he must look at her. As he finally turned, his suffused eyes avoided hers. He was smiling miserably. "Have I made a mistake?" Julia felt blind inside herself. "Mistake?" She laughed nervously. He fumbled for her hands. "Julia!" His emotion could no longer distinguish between her and himself. His face was in her hair. "I can't help it, child! I can't help it!" Finding herself futile and inadequate, it seemed to Julia that her pity for herself must include all the things that surrounded her, and that she must embrace them in the mingled agony of self-contempt and pride. It was because she did not love him that it liberated her so completely to give herself to him. She tried to abase herself utterly so that she might experience the joy of rising above her own needs.