I might have written you a note, but I didn't suppose it mattered." "Yet there is a legend to the effect that men and women sometimes get to be such friends, and have such relations, that a sudden unexplained absence of three months matters a great deal." "That is so.

But--what is the use, Ada?
It doesn't matter with us, does it?
Are we not each capable of taking care of ourselves?
Were we ever of the conventionally sentimental ?" She sighed.

"I suppose not.

But it grew that way a little, didn't it, Grant?
Has it all been nothing to you ?" "I won't say that," he answered.

"It has been a great deal to me, but isn't it wiser to make all in the past tense now?
What have we to gain ?" She tried to smile.