"Then that I never will do;" said Garda, warmly. "And you shall see whether I come out any the worse for it in the end."
"You intend to do what you please, no matter who suffers?"
"They needn't suffer, it's silly to suffer. They'd better go and do what they please."
"And you think that right? You see nothing wrong in it?"
"Oh, right, wrong—I think it's right to be happy, as right as possibly can be; and wrong to be unhappy, as wrong as possibly can be; I think unhappy people do a great deal of harm in the world, besides being so very tiresome! I was a goose to be as unhappy as I was last winter; I might have known that I should either get over caring for him, or else that I should see him again. In this case both happened."
After this declaration of principles the girl walked down the slope and out to the edge of the platform, where she stood in the moonlight looking northward up the lagoon.
"I can just make out his sail," she said, calling back to Margaret, excitedly, and evidently having entirely forgotten her reasoning mood of the moment before. "The fog is rising. Come quick and look."
But Margaret did not come. When the sail finally disappeared, Garda came back, bright and happy. Then, as she saw her friend's face, her own face changed to sudden sympathy.
"Margaret," she said, taking her hands, "I cannot bear to see you so distressed."
"How can I help it?" murmured Margaret. She looked exhausted.