“Not quite yet.” Maurice still leaned near her and looked at her. The golden haze was about them; it shut off everything else. She must love him; only that would content him. Why not find out, and let the future take care of itself? It probably would—her father could probably give them something. He would take to portrait-painting in earnest, write a lot of articles—very incoherent thoughts went through his mind as he contemplated Felicia and hesitated.
In the midst of this hesitation—could he risk a cramping poverty?—would it be base to find out whether she loved him—to make her love him—with no intention of taking such a risk? Felicia raised grave eyes to him. In their unconsciousness of such craven hesitations they seemed to sweep them from him. The clouded intentness of his blue eyes resolved itself—as if a wind had blown bare the sunny ardour of the sky—into a gaze of frankest adoration. He smiled at her silently, and the smile said, “I love you. You are near me. That is why I am happy.”
But Felicia, feeling only a strange fear, looked away.
“Felicia, dearest Felicia,” said Maurice. He took her hand. “I do so adore you. Tell me that you can love me?”
Was it fear or rapture? She did not know. She confessed;
“I suppose it must be that.”
“You do love me?”
“I suppose I do.”
“Oh!—darling!” he exclaimed. He put his arms around her, and, while she still kept her look of almost frightened gravity, he kissed at last his Dresden shepherdess.
It was altogether like an Embarquement pour Cythère, Maurice thought, with the one little corner of his mind that could still see enhancing similes. They were setting sail in the golden haze—what need to ask where bound—to something happy it must be. And, flushed like a wild-rose from his kiss, Felicia felt, too, that swift sailing away into a sunny mist, felt, like the soft speeding through shining waves, relief at the leaving of hostile shores, delightful ease, the soothing of the ruffled frightened heart, afraid of life and of its own loneliness. Life, then, was good, since he loved her. The deliciousness of being loved, after that first shock of wonder—that slipping from the shore to the unknown sea, sang through her like the sea about a prow. Her new trust in life was like a wind bearing her on; with sails all set she went to meet its meaning.