“But you didn’t know that I was in the world this morning.”
He shook his head, as much as to tell her that her objection was quite beside the question. “I know that. But I think I should have missed you just the same, without knowing exactly what I was missing.”
She laughed outright, swaying against him and burying her hands in the green things growing. “You are funny—yes, and dear. I never met a boy like you. You didn’t really think——?”
He gazed at her wonderingly. Each time he looked at her, he found something new that was beautiful. It was her throat this time, long and delicate like a Lent lily. As he watched it, he could see how the laughter bubbled up inside it; he longed, with the instinct of a child, to lay his fingers on it.
“You didn’t really think——?”
He nodded. “That you were going to kill yourself? Yes—and weren’t you?”
She ceased laughing. “I don’t think so. I’m such a coward. And then,” she commenced laughing again, “killing yourself is such a worry—you can only do it once and, if you’re not careful, you don’t look pretty. I always want to look pretty. Do—do you think I’m pretty?”
He choked and swallowed. His mouth was dry. He couldn’t bring his voice to the surface. She drooped her face away from him, pretending to take offense. “You don’t. I can see that. You needn’t tell me.”
His words came with a rush. “I do! I do! I think, when God made you, He must have said to Himself, ‘I’ll make the most beautiful person—the most beautiful person I ever made.’ It was something like that He said.”
His quivering earnestness made her solemn. She hadn’t meant to stir him so deeply. “What an odd way of saying things you have. I don’t suppose God cared much about my making. He just had me manufactured with the rest.”