Slightly moving his position, he said: “Esther, what is sweeter than comprehensive sympathy? Each knows the other’s highest aims and hopes, and each tries to help the other reach and preserve those ideals. There is something beautiful, noble in the endeavor to sustain the ideals of one we love, even though they should not always succeed.”
“I believe that. The desire, the effort—shouldn’t that go for something?”
“I think so, but will you always think it?”
“I hope I shall.”
As they anchored alongside the bank, Glenn held out his hand to help her; her cheeks were in bloom with life, and he was going home rested, with all his senses and passions much keener and many degrees finer in their possibilities.
“We have had a day of delicious happiness, we should be thankful for that,” he said. “In a whole life there are but a few days in which we really live—we only exist most of the time,” lowering his voice and looking into her sweet eyes.
“To be wholly happy is to forget the world and one’s obligations to it.” There was almost a caress in the way Glenn took out his handkerchief and lightly brushed the drops of water from her skirt. In putting the handkerchief back he touched the pretty trifle—a souvenir to recall her twenty-first birthday. Twirling it between his fingers he said:
“This is for you. Wear it for the sake of the man who became a boy and learned what May meant.”
CHAPTER III.
Glenn knew now that he had been mistaken. The heart he had tended drew all its life still from him. His knowledge of men and women was great. He could not deceive himself. Nature demanded a climax. He must advance or retreat. He realized that he was coming to love her too well—in a sweeter, nearer way. They were to each other now more of a necessity than an inspirational force. He must go away—it was best: for their art, for their peace of mind. It was some time before he could tell her this. He could no longer trust himself to be tender with her. He dared not risk himself; he was not equal to it. It seemed to him their companionship was never so beautiful as now when he was about to break it. He was testing his strength and asking his own soul if it were fit for the work and the awful sacrifice. It was during a short interview that he found courage to tell her how his doctor had advised a change of scene and air. A sea voyage, with perhaps a year abroad; possibly Egypt—personally he hardly expected to get beyond the old yellow city of his youthful escapades—Paris, where the aromatic breath of absinthe had tinged the air. There would be no strain then. She knew what it meant. She knew it was not for his health alone that he was putting the sea between them.