She smiled at him. He seemed unconscious of fate, happy and strong. She smiled upon him almost in condescension.
“I should like to realize your dream,” she said. “This is terrible!”
They went to the cliff’s edge, to receive the cool up-flow of air from the water. She drank the travelling freshness eagerly with her face, and put forward her sunburnt arms to be refreshed.
“It is really a very fine sun,” said Siegmund lightly. “I feel as if I were almost satisfied with heat.”
Helena felt the chagrin of one whose wretchedness must go unperceived, while she affects a light interest in another’s pleasure. This time, when Siegmund “failed to follow her”, as she put it, she felt she must follow him.
“You are having your satisfaction complete this journey,” she said, smiling; “even a sufficiency of me.”
“Ay!” said Siegmund drowsily. “I think I am. I think this is about perfect, don’t you?”
She laughed.
“I want nothing more and nothing different,” he continued; “and that’s the extreme of a decent time, I should think.”
“The extreme of a decent time!” she repeated.