"I'll fix something; don't you worry. We'll all be back in a fortnight. And I like loving old people in new places."
Laughing, she thanked him for the compliment. She was never harsh or bitter with Kirby.
"And in different climates?"
"There is no climate in this infernal country. It's all just weather. One day, you Indian woman, we'll run away together, South, and remember what it is to get comfortably tropical."
He spoke carelessly ... but out of the words "we" and "our" she wove herself a garment of warmth.... It was all right—romance was not at an end for her; romance was hers, here, and in London, and beyond London—he had said: "One day...."
Directly after sunset, on the last evening of his holiday, Gareth went down to the harbour.
Full tide. The waves had ceased to dash in; and jet-carved against the dull gold sky, cargo-steamer and sailing-boat floated high upon the brimming water, that was tranquil as a mother with babe at her breast. Ever and anon, a larger undulation from beyond the harbour mouth swang and stirred luminous green depths, and shivered the dreaming reflections of white wall and mauve roof and pink roof, till they spread in dark stains of wet over the edge of the quay.... A great lazy sea-monster, slobbering its triumph over a victim foredoomed.... Yes, the tide exhaled an evil impression to-night ... more than mere peace in this boundless endless ripple ... slumberous, replete....
Thus water would look when at last it could claim Kay Rollinson.
... For years he would have forgotten his round adventure. He had met the girl of his vision, the girl of the February wood; he was free when he met her; she had laid cool fingers on the fear in his heart, till it was at rest; till he ceased to defy it and grapple with it—but went to live with her inland, far inland, where there was no sea to remind him.