“I was thinking just now if you and I should part, dear—if their case were ours!”
“Oh, Reuben!”
And so the grief of the old was a part of the joy of the young, tender-hearted as they were. They played round the mournful old history.
“But you would speak, Reuben? You would never let me go without a word?”
“And if I didn't speak, dear? If something held me back from speaking?”
“But you wouldn't let it hold you back.”
“Not now, darling. But I might have done yesterday—before I knew.”
Before he knew! He must have always known! But of that she would say nothing.
In front of the one village shop in which the pair of window candles still glimmered, they paused, while Reuben searched his pocket-book for the note, and then went on again, in perfumed darkness, until they reached the gate of Rachel's cottage.
“Be brave, darling,” Reuben whispered here. “Don't let her repulse you easily.”