The Love That Prevailed

by Frank Frankfort Moore

The night was cool, without being cold, and there was a sweet freshness in the air which had certainly been wanting when he had walked along the cliffs in the afternoon. The thunderstorm did not seem at that time to have cleared the atmosphere. He was rather surprised to find that there was such a high sea rolling at this time, and he came to the conclusion that there had been a gale while he was asleep. Clouds were still hiding the sky, but they held no rain.

He shunned the cliff track, going in the opposite direction, which led him past the village, and on to the steep sandy bay with its occasional little peninsulas of high rocks, the surfaces of which were not covered even by Spring tides. Very quiet the little port seemed at this hour. Not a light was in any window—not a sound came from any of the cottages. He stood for a long time on the little wharf looking at the silent row of cottages. That one which had the rose-bush trained over the porch was the home of the Polwheles, he knew, and he remained with his eyes fixed upon it. It seemed as if this had been the object of his walk—to stand thus in front of that house, as any youthful lover might stand beneath the lattice that he loved.

He had his thoughts to think, and he found that this was the time to think them. They were all about the girl who slept beyond that window. He wondered if he had ever loved her before this moment. If he had really loved her, how was it that he had never before been led to this place to watch the house where she lay asleep? Was it possible that he had fancied he knew her before he had passed those hours with her when the storm was raging around them? He felt that without this experience he could not possibly have known what manner of girl she was.

And now that he had come to know her the knowledge came to him with the thought that she was not for him.

He had set out in the morning feeling that perhaps he had been too hasty in coming to the conclusion that because, when far away from her he had been thinking a great deal of his own loneliness and the joy that her companionship would bring to him, he loved her. That was why he had wished to put himself to the test, and he had fancied that he was doing so when he had walked in the opposite direction to that in which the village lay so that he might avoid the chance of meeting her.

But in spite of his elaborate precautions—he actually thought that it had shown ingenuity on his part—he had met her, and he had learned without putting the question to her that she was not for him. He recalled what his feeling had been at that moment. He had fancied that he knew all that her words meant to him; but he had deceived himself; it was only now that he knew exactly the measure of what they meant to him. It seemed to him that he had known nothing of the girl before he had passed those dark hours by her side.

At that time it was as if all the world had been blotted out, only he and she being left alone.

This feeling he now knew was what was meant by loving—this feeling that there was nothing left in the world—that nothing mattered so long as he and she were together—that death itself would be welcome if only it did not sunder them.

And he had gained that knowledge only to know that they were to be sundered.

It was a bitter thought, and for a time, as he stood there with his eyes fixed upon the cottage, he felt as if so far as he was concerned the world had come to an end. The happiness which he had seen before him as plainly as if it had been a painted picture—a picture of the fireside in the home that he hoped for—had been blotted out from before his eyes, and in its stead there was a blank. It did not matter how that blank might be filled in, it would never contain the picture that had been torn away from before him when she had of her own free will told him the story of her love.