Walking, smart walking, was the only relief he experienced; physical exertion was reputedly an antidote to mental excitement. He felt sufficient energy to have moved on indefinitely. Wished he could walk on till he fell from exhaustion. In that there would have been satisfaction; rest, at any rate. Rest from that tumultuous tide of recrimination surging in his brain.
His anger was directed against himself; no one else. It upsprung from the fact that he had been such a fool, such an utter, absolute fool, as to be gulled by a woman! Scoffingly he told himself that anger against her would be unfair; that her behaviour had been merely typical of her sex!
He, who had ever with his pen written against womankind—until at last reviewers had spoken of his work as being that of a woman-hater—to have fallen such an easy victim to the first siren who spread her snare for him! The thought was fuel to the maddening fever in possession of him.
Then came before him her face; those sweet, eloquent, soulful eyes! Well, he endeavoured to comfort himself with the thought that any man would have fallen a victim as he had done. The amount of comfort in it, though, would have found resting-place on a needle's point.
There was an underlying reason for the failure. Granted that his ideal was shattered, he still loved its ruins. Therein lay the hopelessness of it all—and he knew it. Striding on, he savagely kicked out of his way, now and then, a stone. Poor sort of relief again.
The configuration of the coast line brought him to an abrupt standstill. The cliff, jutting out, was met by a barrier of high rocks. These latter were overgrown with seaweed of the slipperiest sort: defiance bidding. Nature's sudden intervention in his proceedings produced a corresponding interruption in his thoughts.
Why should he think about this woman any longer? She was not worth wasting thought over. He had been happy enough without her—before he knew her. So he would be happy without her still.
Cut the thought of her clean out of his mind; out of his heart. That, he told himself, was the correct thing to do. Life should be for him as if he had never seen her, never looked into the unfathomable depths of those forget-me-not eyes. It would be quite easy; a little effort of will was needed—that was all.
All that he meant; every word of it. Framed a resolution that he looked on as adamantine. But he ignored an important factor; made no allowance for the strange vitality of that prolific pure white flower: Love.
The axe of common sense may be laid to the root of the tree; may cut it down root and branch. Still one small remaining tendril, hidden from the sight, will work its way into the heart; spread and grow until in its magnitude it overshadows every other thought. Such is love.