“I love you,” he said, with absolute conviction, absolute sincerity. She raised her head and gave him a sudden, fierce little kiss.
“What was the matter with us this evening?” she cried. “How could we have been so stupid, after we’ve loved each other so long?”
It was just that, the long thwarting and crushing of their love, that had so wounded them both. That love, without a sign, without so much as a hand-clasp, starved, chilled, denied, had grown morose and fearful. It was only now, with her pitiful and lovely feminine gesture, that she had broken down the barrier between them. Their love had nothing to do with suitability and expediency, as known to them: it was suitable and expedient according to a plan older and subtler than the social one of which they were aware. They were the one man and the one woman. There was something between them indestructible and inexplicable, something sturdier and deeper than desire and yet whose root was in desire.
Rosaleen, thrilled and exultant as she was, was nevertheless a woman, and forever anxious.
“You’re sure?” she asked. “You’re sure I won’t ruin your life if I marry you?”
“I’m sure you’ll ruin my life if you don’t!” he said.
They saw nothing but the life that lay before them: they had forgotten all that had gone by: they had forgotten the past, as much a part of their eternal existence as anything which might yet come.
THE END
| Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber: |
|---|
| For it not the love Lawrence meant.=> For it was not the love Lawrence meant. {pg 234} beside which stook a great=> beside which stood a great {pg 240} |