This Side of Paradise

ROSALIND: Don't be a silly idiot. You know you're the only man I've ever loved, ever will love.

AMORY: (Quickly) Rosalind, let's get married--next week.

ROSALIND: We can't.

AMORY: Why not?

ROSALIND: Oh, we can't. I'd be your squaw--in some horrible place.

AMORY: We'll have two hundred and seventy-five dollars a month all told.

ROSALIND: Darling, I don't even do my own hair, usually.

AMORY: I'll do it for you.

ROSALIND: (Between a laugh and a sob) Thanks.

AMORY: Rosalind, you can't be thinking of marrying some one else. Tell me! You leave me in the dark. I can help you fight it out if you'll only tell me.

ROSALIND: It's just--us. We're pitiful, that's all. The very qualities I love you for are the ones that will always make you a failure.

AMORY: (Grimly) Go on.

ROSALIND: Oh--it is Dawson Ryder. He's so reliable, I almost feel that he'd be a--a background.

AMORY: You don't love him.

ROSALIND: I know, but I respect him, and he's a good man and a strong one.

AMORY: (Grudgingly) Yes--he's that.

ROSALIND: Well--here's one little thing. There was a little poor boy we met in Rye Tuesday afternoon--and, oh, Dawson took him on his lap and talked to him and promised him an Indian suit--and next day he remembered and bought it--and, oh, it was so sweet and I couldn't help thinking he'd be so nice to--to our children--take care of them--and I wouldn't have to worry.

AMORY: (In despair) Rosalind! Rosalind!

ROSALIND: (With a faint roguishness) Don't look so consciously suffering.

AMORY: What power we have of hurting each other!

ROSALIND: (Commencing to sob again) It's been so perfect--you and I. So like a dream that I'd longed for and never thought I'd find. The first real unselfishness I've ever felt in my life. And I can't see it fade out in a colorless atmosphere!

AMORY: It won't--it won't!

ROSALIND: I'd rather keep it as a beautiful memory--tucked away in my heart.

AMORY: Yes, women can do that--but not men. I'd remember always, not the beauty of it while it lasted, but just the bitterness, the long bitterness.

ROSALIND: Don't!

AMORY: All the years never to see you, never to kiss you, just a gate shut and barred--you don't dare be my wife.

ROSALIND: No--no--I'm taking the hardest course, the strongest course. Marrying you would be a failure and I never fail--if you don't stop walking up and down I'll scream!

(Again he sinks despairingly onto the lounge.) AMORY: Come over here and kiss me.

ROSALIND: No.

AMORY: Don't you want to kiss me?

ROSALIND: To-night I want you to love me calmly and coolly.