"Will you come out again later?" he pleaded, content, under the circumstances, that she should leave him now.
Louise nodded and passed into the cottage.
"Couldn't we take a little walk on the beach later, if your head is better? Later on, when the sun isn't quite so hot?"
She turned and murmured: "Yes." There was another impulse to throw herself into his arms; she longed to go to him and cry against his heart. But at the same moment she remembered Leslie—how close he had held her in the morning, how they had kissed.... The impulse was stifled.
When she was gone from him, Barry sat down again on the porch to finish his cigar. It was the cigar which the Rev. Needham had given him after luncheon. It was a good cigar, for the Rev. Needham knew what was what, despite his intense holiness.
Barry was one of those rare individuals who have never really loved before. Curiously, the insatiable god Eros had passed him largely by till now. But ah—the tardy fevers! They may be more virulent than those of timelier visitation.... His eye swept the curve of the white beach, ablaze with the mid-day sun. Later they would be strolling there together, he and she. He would be walking out there beside this dear girl whose love had thrilled to the dull roots of his bachelordom. And then he would tell her how he adored her; would open the little box and slip the ring on her finger....
It was so wonderful, after dwelling in the desert all his life!