She stopped. Her eyes were turned towards the little bed where Paul was sleeping, while one of her hands had sought her forehead again, as if the pain had returned. And, as I looked at her, I became uneasy with a sense that she esteemed me too highly and gave me credit I didn't and couldn't deserve, for, in the heart of me, I knew I loved her with such intensity of feeling that it hurt me with the bitterest of pangs.
Ay! She had said it. There could be no other love for her! The old one was still strong in her soul, for the man she would never see again but whose image was graven so deep in her memory that he was still with her, a vision upstanding though silent, listening to the prayers she said for him and, perhaps, in her sleep, no longer a mute wraith of the beloved, but one who whispered again softly some of the words of long ago. I would fain, also, have prayed for courage never to bare my heart to her, for strength enabling me to remain the disinterested friend she deemed me, to whom she could at least give affection and trust.
"It is late, David," she finally said. "Good night. I think I will read that last chapter of the 'Land o' Love,' again, before I go to sleep. It will show me a world full of fine big things and bring the blessedness of new hope."
"I hope it will, my dear Frances," I answered, and returned to my room where I touched a match to the gas and filled my big calabash. As I looked about me, I felt that my little kingdom was a rather bare and shabby one. Hitherto it had been perfectly sufficient for my needs, nor had I ever seen in it anything to find fault with. In fact I had many a time thought myself fortunate in having so secure a retreat, which only the feet of faithful friends could be attracted to. They would come to it only for the sake of their old David. They were content to sit on the edge of the bed, if the chairs gave out. But now I realized that for some time strange dreams had been coming to me, of a possibility that in its occupant a marvelous and glorious creature might one day find something kindred, a heart to which her own would respond. I had begun to lift my eyes up to her and now I saw how pitiful the room and the lodger must seem to her. I felt that all that I should ever get out of life would be fiction, invention, the playing of tunes on hearts of my own creation that would never beat for me saving in printed pages. Never could they become my very own; always, they would go out to others, to laugh or weep or yawn over. They would represent but pieces of silver with which I might perhaps bring a bit of happiness to a few, after paying for my shelter and food, and the clothes which Gordon asserts are never really made for me.
Poor old Gordon! Frieda predicted that he would be hoist by his own petard, some day, and it has come to pass. He is now far out of sight of land, and his head is still awhirl with the amazing wrecking of his schemes. It would have been a bigger thing for him to do, and a braver, to have gone to that splendid girl Sophia Van Rossum and confessed he had sinned against her, and begged her pardon, humbly. I suppose he has written to her and explained that he has lost the right even to touch the hem of her garment. It is good that he had the saving grace not to keep up his pretence of love for her, but his sudden and amazing departure shows how keenly he has felt the blow. His ambitions have flown, his plans gone a-gley, and the one thing that could remain was the eager searching for an immediate change, for a reckless occupation in whose pursuit he might gamble with his life and, perhaps, throw it away. I saw his purpose, clearly. In the ambulance corps there would be no long months of drilling, no marching up and down fields and roads clear of any enemy. He could at once go to work and play his part in the great game. May he return safely, and may the hand of time deal gently with him! Were I fitted for it, I should gladly take his place. The idea of also running away, before temptation becomes unendurable, is beginning to appeal to me with no little strength.
But what could I do at that front where they want men of youthful vigor and bravery, in whom the generous sap of life at its finest runs swiftly? I think I will have to remain here and continue to turn out my little stories. I will keep on giving them a happy ending, that my readers may finish them contentedly. But always I shall remain conscious of the tale of my own life, in which there will never be an entrance into that happiness I so freely bestow on the poor little children of my imagination.
Yet, who knows? It may be that, for many years yet, I may from time to time see Frances, even if her art should take her at times far from me. She may teach Baby Paul to look upon me as some sort of uncle, who bears him great affection and even love. The boy may, in the future, come to me and tell me of his pleasures and his pains, and listen to the advice old fellows so freely and uselessly give. And I will talk to him of his mother, of the brave good woman who toiled for him, who shed the benison of her tenderness on him, and yet had some left that she could bestow on the obscure scribbler. Never will I tell him that the writer of stories loved her, for that is something that must remain locked up in my heart.