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<h2> VI </h2>
<p>It was long past midnight, and the terrier’s hints became imperious.</p>
<p>Merrick rose from his chair, pushed back a fallen log and put up the
fender. He walked across the room and stared a moment at the Brangwyn
etching before which Paulina Trant had paused at a memorable turn of their
talk. Then he came back and laid his hand on my shoulder.</p>
<p>“She summed it all up, you know, when she said that one way of finding out
whether a risk is worth taking is <i>not</i> to take it, and then to see
what one becomes in the long run, and draw one’s inferences. The long run—well,
we’ve run it, she and I. I know what I’ve become, but that’s nothing to
the misery of knowing what she’s become. She had to have some kind of
life, and she married Reardon. Reardon’s a very good fellow in his way;
but the worst of it is that it’s not her way....</p>
<p>“No: the worst of it is that now she and I meet as friends. We dine at the
same houses, we talk about the same people, we play bridge together, and I
lend her books. And sometimes Reardon slaps me on the back and says: ‘Come
in and dine with us, old man! What you want is to be cheered up!’ And I go
and dine with them, and he tells me how jolly comfortable she makes him,
and what an ass I am not to marry; and she presses on me a second helping
of <i>poulet Maryland</i>, and I smoke one of Reardon’s cigars, and at
half-past ten I get into my overcoat, and walk back alone to my rooms....”</p>
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