"But, as soon as I saw you, I knew that—that—" She broke down again and wept.
"I will tell you about her, Rosalie—" His fingers stroked her hair, and, bending over her, his face was near her hands.
"No, no, tell me nothing—oh, if you tell me!—"
"She came to hear from me what she ought to have heard from the Notary.
She has had great trouble—the man—her child—and I have helped her,
told her—" His face was so near now that his breath was on her hair.
She suddenly raised her head and clasped his face in her hands.
"I knew—oh, I knew, I knew . . . !" she wept, and her eyes drank his.
"Rosalie, my life!" he cried, clasping her in his arms.
The love that was in him, new-born and but half understood, poured itself out in broken words like her own. For him there was no outside world; no past, no Kathleen, no Billy; no suspicion, or infidelity, or unfaith; no fear of disaster; no terrors of the future. Life was Now to him and to her: nothing brooded behind, nothing lay before. The candle spluttered and burnt low in the socket.
ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
A left-handed boy is all right in the world
Damnable propinquity
Hugging the chain of denial to his bosom
I have a good memory for forgetting
Importunity with discretion was his motto
It is good to live, isn't it?
Know how bad are you, and doesn't mind
Strike first and heal after—"a kick and a lick"