And she looked around her with wistful eyes, in which her lover read a wish that things would ever remain as they were now—that this moment would never pass away.
“You would remain here—you would hide yourself here with me for ever!” cried the happy Moyse.
“Here, or anywhere;—in the cottage at Breda;—in your father’s hut on the shore;—anywhere, Moyse, where there is nothing to dread. I live in fear; and I am wretched.”
“What is it that you fear, love? Why do you not trust, me to protect you?”
“Then I fear for you, which is worse. Why cannot we live in the woods or the mountains, where there would be no dangerous duties, and no cares?”
“And if we lived in the woods, you would be more terrified still. There would never be a falling star, but your heart would sink. You would take the voices of the winds for the spirits of the woods, and the mountain mists for ghosts. Then, there are the tornado and the thunderbolt. When you saw the trees crashing, you would be for making haste back to the plain. Whenever you heard the rock rolling and bounding down the steep, or the cataract rising and roaring in the midst of the tempest, you would entreat me to fly to the city. It is in this little beating heart that the fear lies.”
“What then is to be done?”
“This little heart must beat yet a while longer; and then, when I have once come back, it shall rest upon mine for ever.”
“Beside my father? He never rests. Your father would leave us in peace; but he has committed you to one who knows not what rest is.”
“Nor ever will,” said Moyse. “If he closed his eyes, if he relaxed his hand, we should all be sunk in ruin.”