They walked on for a while in silence, and still in silence made their way down to the shore, scrambling with difficulty over the slippery rocks. When they came upon a stretch of sand he called a halt. They seated themselves close together on the sand, and he took his coat and put it about both their shoulders.
“The nights turn in chilly,” he said. “Do you remember how hot it was when we sat here before?”
“Yes,” she replied, and drew closer to him. “Everything seems changed,” she said,—“even you—you, perhaps, most of all.”
“I know I am changed,” he allowed. “I’ve been through a good deal since I saw you...”
He could not, he discovered, tell her then the nature of the thing which had changed him. He had meant to, but when he tried to express himself he could not find the words.
“I’ve been through a good deal,” he repeated. He played with the cold damp sand, and his manner became more aloof, less intimate and confidential. “Life changes most of us.”
“Because life hurts,” she said.
He looked at her closely, recalling the bright girlishness of her when last they had talked together.
“You are depressed,” he said. “I am inclined to believe that becoming a Puritan doesn’t agree with you.”
She laughed a little tonelessly, and expressed the wish that she had been born a man.