and I simply don’t feel that I CAN do it.’

Again there was a long pause, before Hermione replied:

‘Not if you don’t want to.’ Then again there was silence. Hermione shuddered with a strange desire. Ah, if only he had asked HER to subserve him, to be his slave! She shuddered with desire.

‘You see I can’t — ’

‘But exactly in what does — ’

They had both begun at once, they both stopped. Then, Hermione, assuming priority of speech, resumed as if wearily:

‘To what does he want you to submit?’

‘He says he wants me to accept him non-emotionally, and finally —