But weren't you horrid with him?
Didn't you do something that knocked him to pieces ?" "What, pray ?" "Making him feel as if he were nothing--I know," Paul declared.
"You are so clever, my friend," she said coolly.
The conversation broke off there.

But it made her cool with him for some time.
She very rarely saw Miriam now.

The friendship between the two women was not broken off, but considerably weakened.
"Will you come in to the concert on Sunday afternoon ?" Clara asked him just after Christmas.
"I promised to go up to Willey Farm," he replied.
"Oh, very well." "You don't mind, do you ?" he asked.
"Why should I ?" she answered.
Which almost annoyed him.
"You know," he said, "Miriam and I have been a lot to each other ever since I was sixteen--that's seven years now." "It's a long time," Clara replied.
"Yes; but somehow she--it doesn't go right--" "How ?" asked Clara.
"She seems to draw me and draw me, and she wouldn't leave a single hair of me free to fall out and blow away--she'd keep it." "But you like to be kept." "No," he said, "I don't.

I wish it could be normal, give and take--like me and you.

I want a woman to keep me, but not in her pocket." "But if you love her, it couldn't be normal, like me and you." "Yes; I should love her better then.