"So you see our love was not strong enough after all to weather the storms, Val!"
"Mine was ... mine is," her heart cried out, but she looked at him dully. She knew the futility of such words now. It was his own dead love he was keening, not hers.
"Our ship of dreams has gone to pieces."
"No," burst from her lips almost against her will.
"Yes, Val," his gentle tone became stern. "Face the facts."
They had seated themselves on some rocks near the edge of the cliff. Nothing broke the peace of the evening but the swirr and swish of the gentle tide on the beach below.
"You promised to burn your boats ... never to go back to old habits and possessions ... I find you with your old possessions about you----"
"Those pictures and chintzes? I wrote and told you how they came," she interrupted. "They can be burnt for all they are to me."
He moved his hand with a desperate gesture.
"That is nothing to the other. Can you deny that you have returned to one at least of your old habits?"