You never know what she is going to do next.
Safety lies in checking the tears--in administering a tonic.

Still, her wish to retain me was very touching.

I rose and stood before her by the mantelpiece.
"You can't have your pudding and eat it too," said I.
"What do you mean ?" "You can't have Captain Vauvenarde for your husband, Dale for your _cavaliere servente_, and myself for your guide, philosopher and friend all at the same time." "Which would you advise me to give up ?" "That's obvious.

Give up Dale." She uttered a sound midway between a sob and a laugh, and said, as it seemed, ironically: "Would you take his place ?" Somewhat ironically, too, I replied, "A crock, my dear lady, with one foot in the grave has no business to put the other into the _Pays du Tendre_." But all the same I had an absurd desire to take her at her word, not for the sake of constituting myself her _amant en titre_, but so as to dispossess the poor boy who was clamouring wildly for her among his mother's snuffy colleagues in Berlin.
"That's another reason why I shrink from your going in search of my husband," she said, dabbing her eyes.

"Your ill-health." "I shall have to go abroad out of this dreadful climate in any case.
Doctor's orders.