She offered no opinion upon this, but turned her head a little to the right, away from him. The sunset appeared in her cheeks.
“Your true lover,” he went on, pursuing his own fancy, “when footing the soft grass of a country lane is, in reality, blazing a trail through the tangled everglades of Florida. He is in search of the Fountain of Youth. He is on a voyage of discovery as momentous as that of Columbus for he, too, is after a new world. Your lover, even at home, is ever challenging the rugged heights of Alaska in search of hidden gold.”
She kept her eyes fixed upon the burning West.
“And the dangers he faces?”
“My soul, the dangers!” exclaimed Barnes. “The dangers are innumerable and terrifying. If he stumbles on so much as a phrase, he is plunged into a chasm of despair a mile deep. On every side he is confronted by icy glaciers of reserve that half hide the stars in his firmament. If he swerve one whit from the straight path, he is involved in a tangle of misunderstandings. Hostile Indians of the tribe Jaloux attack him at every point. If he move too fast, he is torn to shreds by rebuking thorns; if he go too slow, he perishes and no one mourns. Fever and thirst and heart-hunger are his. In ambush lie shaggy bears of prejudices, wild hyenas of relatives, and—”
“Don’t,” she laughed uneasily, “you quite frighten one.”
“This falling in love is no small matter,” he avowed.
“You would not think then that so many men would venture.”
“You would not think that so many men would go to sea in boats; you would not think that so many men would go to wars; you would not think that so many men would try to paint.”
The sky was like a burnished gold floor; was like the yellow sand that lies below Indian waters. The world looked marvelously serene to her. And yet she felt as though the West were calling her. It was as though a soft hand had suddenly been put within hers and were tenderly drawing her towards the sunset. When she turned back to the house, it was as though she were turning away from something. The brick house looming before her in the dusk gave less a promise of shelter than of restriction. The walls which had always given her a peaceful sense of security, now appeared more like those of a retaining castle. It is an odd illusion which can turn a fortress into a prison. It is equaled only by that which turns a prison into a fortress.