"I will do that," he said, and taking her hand, he pressed it thankfully.
Every preparation and arrangement was made for an early start, and Ralph wandered in and out of the house, impatient as a wild beast to break away and be gone. Cicely, whose soul was full of his sorrow, went out to him on the piazza, where he stood, looking at the late moon rising above the treetops.
"What a different man I should be," he said, "if I could think that
Miriam was standing on the seashore and looking at that moon."
Cicely longed to comfort him, but she could not say anything which would seem to have reason in it. She had tried to think that it might be possible that the despatch might not concern Miriam, but she could not do it. If it had been necessary to send a despatch and Miriam had been alive and well, it would have been from her that the despatch would have come. Cicely's soul was sick with sorrow and with dread, not only for the brother, but for herself, for she and Miriam were now fast friends. But she controlled herself, and looking up with a smile, said, "What time is it?"
Ralph took out his watch and held the face of it toward the moon, which was but little past the full.
"It is a quarter to nine," he said.
"Well, then," said she, "I will ask Miriam, when I see her, if she was looking at the moon at this time."
"Do you believe," exclaimed Ralph, turning suddenly so that they stood face to face, "do you truly believe that we shall ever see her again?"
The question was so abrupt that Cicely was taken unawares. She raised her face toward the eager eyes bent upon her, but the courageous words she wished to utter would not come, and she drooped her head. With a swift movement, Ralph put his two hands upon her cheeks and gently raised her face. He need not have looked at her, for the warm tears ran down upon his hands.
"You do not," he said; and as he gazed down upon her, her face became dim. For the first time since his boyhood, tears filled his eyes.