His words touched me
"It isn't that I don't want to take chances, Mr. Nodelman. It's
something else. Were you ever in love, Mr. Nodelman?"
"What? Was I in love? Why?" he demanded, coloring. "What put it
in your head to ask me such a funny question?"
"Funny! There's more pain than fun in it. Well, I have loved, Mr.
Nodelman, and that's why it's so hard for me to think of marriage
as a cold proposition. I don't think I could marry a girl I did not
love."
I expected an argument against love-marriages, but Nodelman had
none to offer. Instead, he had me dilate on the bliss and the agony
of loving. He asked me questions and eagerly listened to my
answers. I told him of my own two love-affairs, particularly of my
relations with Dora. I omitted names and other details that might
have pointed, ever so remotely, to Mrs.
Margolis's identity. Nodelman was interested intensely. His
interrogations were of the kind that a girl of sixteen who had not
yet loved might address to a bosom friend who had. How does it
feel to be in doubt whether one's passion had found an echo? How
did I feel when our lips were joined in our first kiss? How did she
carry herself the next time I saw her? Was she shy? Did she look
happy? Was she afraid of her husband? Was I afraid? The
restaurant had been nearly deserted for about an hour, and we still
sat smoking cigars and whispering
CHAPTER III ONE day, as Nodelman took his seat across the
table from me at the restaurant, he said: "Well, Levinsky, it's no
use, you'll have to get married now.
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