She was very beautiful in the simplicity of her pathos—one of the most beautiful women he had ever
met. She had become a little child for the moment and her littleness was baffling. He felt extraordinarily near to her and alone with her. There was no longer any danger in their aloneness. He realized why it was that she was able to give away so much of herself; there was no value in the gift, for her heart was beyond the capture of any man. She was the shuttered house of a vanished happiness, inhabited by a restless ghost. The gold light from the lamp fell in a pool about her. It revealed startlingly the whiteness of her arms and throat, the blueness of her eyes and the primrose gleam of her polished head. She seemed insubstantial as a dream, environed by shadows. And what did she mean by saying that all her best lay in the past? Surely she had misjudged! With her power of charm she could build her world to any pattern.
"The best in the past! None of us know enough about the future to say that. The best lies ahead—always. To believe that brings our best within our grasp."
"For me it can't." She spoke hopelessly. "No believing can do that when your best is dead."
The finality of her despair silenced him. He could feel it like fingers tightening on his throat. He realized in a flash that this was how he, too, would be tempted to speak were he to lose Terry—that, having lost the best, any careless makeshift would suffice to comfort him. While he considered, her hands snuggled closer in his clasp, establishing a new sympathy.
"I think," he said at last, "even though my best
were dead, I should try to go on acting as if it lay still ahead. If I did that, round some new turning I might find it waiting for me as a kind of recompense."
She leant forward, peering eagerly into his eyes. "Yes. You would do that. I'm sure of it. I knew you had something to give me the moment we met. That was why I wouldn't let you escape me. I've learnt the secret at last—the secret of your air of conquest. It isn't that you get your desires. It's not that. It's your belief that you will get them that makes you strong."
Somewhere at the back of his head he remembered the pleading of Delilah with Samson, "Tell me, I pray thee, wherein thy great strength lieth."
He laughed. "Perhaps you have guessed. I'm what you might call a round-the-corner person. I have a philosophy all my own; it's a round-the-corner philosophy. I believe that we find everything that we've lost or longed for, if we'll only press on. Everything that we've ever loved or wanted waits for us further up the road, round some hidden turning. It's always further up the road and just out of sight. The whole trick of living is to keep your tail up and march forward with the appearance of success, no matter how badly other people say you've been defeated. More often than not, we're nearer our hidden corners than any of us guess; it's the pluck to struggle the last hundred yards that swings us round the turning and wins our kingdoms for us."