“Floating around, like this, King. It’s awful! Floating around in the ocean, this a-way. And no chaperone!”
“Except the moon.”
“And not—engaged, even!”
“Awful, Billee!”
“King, can you float with only one hand behind you, like you did that night?”
“Yes, Beautiful, without either.”
“Lend me one—up here, please—the left one.” He gave her the hand, much puzzled. Slipping from his finger the little circlet of gold, she placed it on her own, in silence. And in silence her cheek lay again on his breast.
“Billee,” he whispered, in awe, “Billee!” Then she lifted herself a little and Father Ocean, with a deep intake of breath, lifted her a little more. Only her finger tips touched his shoulders; her body floated free. She hovered over him as Psyche over the sleeping god, her lips, one moment, on his: “Just sweethearts,” she whispered, and was gone.
King never forgot the picture that followed. Try as he might, he could not overtake her. Into and out of the waves, over and under, she fled, a moonbeam, a silver fish. Once, for a single, marvelous moment, she sprung half out of the foam crest of a giant roller, her face turned back, her fallen hair strewn around it. A hand was lifted, beckoning. Then, a white flash, and down the slope beyond she vanished.
“The ideal!” he murmured, “the ideal!” He followed. He had been following all his life.