"Because I haven't any right to."
"Doesn't my coming prove you had a right to? You see you did call me, and I came."
After a moment he answered irrelevantly,—
"I'm a cowardly sort of chap. When I feel like calling you, I choke it down. I don't want to get the habit of you."
"Why not?"
"One reason—it will be so difficult when you go away."
A sense of freedom and happiness possessed her. Words rose tumultuously to her lips, to be choked there. She wanted to say unreasonably, "I shall never go away. How could you think it?" But instead she asked, with a happy indirection, "Where am I going?"
He, too, answered lightly,—
"How should I know? Back into your cloud, I guess—dear goddess." The last words were very low, and to himself, but she heard them. Instantly and against all reason, she, who had never meant to be happy again, laughed ecstatically.
"Think," she said, "a month ago I didn't know you were in the world."