"I assure you I am truly sorry if I have offended you.

It was nothing--a mere matter of--" the word "habit," she knew, hovered on his lips, though he did not utter it, and broke off inconclusively.
So there had not been even the excuse of emotion about it.

He had embraced her as instinctively, as methodically, as he might have switched on the electric light over his desk.

Here again she was brought to a stop before an overwhelming realization of the fundamental differences between man and woman.

To think of woman behaving like that merely because it had become a matter of habit! "I always liked you, you know," he said abruptly, with a sincere emphasis.
"Well, there are different ways of liking," she rejoined coldly, "and I happen not to care for this way." "If you don't like it, I'll never do it again," he promised, almost humbly.