"Nothing does," he declared restlessly. "I'm a wanderer on the face of the earth, and I don't pick up much as I go along. I'm getting old, you know. Life isn't what it was."
Maud was silent for a few moments, the starlight in her eyes. "I sometimes wonder," she said at length, "if you have ever really lived yet."
He laughed on a mocking note. "My dear girl, I—who have done everything!"
She shook her head. "No, not everything, Charlie."
"Everything that's bad," he suggested recklessly.
She put out a hand to him that went into his quick hold and lay there with perfect confidence. "I don't think you're really old," she said. "I think you're just beginning to grow up. No, don't laugh! I am quite serious. You are just beginning to discriminate between the things that are worth while and those that are not."
"Is anything worth while?" said Saltash.
"Yes, yes. Heaps of things. But not the things you care for,—not just the wild pleasures of life. Charlie, I'm not good at expressing things, and I'm afraid—just a little—of trespassing, even though we are such old friends."
Her voice had a wistful note. He carried her hand to his lips. "Ma belle reine, is it possible? You?"
Her fingers closed upon his. "I hate you to be world-tired and lonely.
But I would rather have you that than feeding on husks."