"I seemed like one caught in the tow of some swift tide, always fighting to get back, yet eternally being drawn away. The tide still flows out, for the tide of human life is the only tide which never returns, but I have ceased to struggle. I no longer look back. It is not that God has forgiven me (I have never been able to think of God as otherwise than forgiving), it is that I have forgiven myself."
CHAPTER XV
"It amounts to this, then," said Willits presently. "You are cured. The balance is swinging true again. It has taken a long time, but the cure is all the more complete for that. Now, when are you coming back to us?"
Callandar did not answer.
"You are needed. Not a day passes that your absence is not felt. You used to have a strong sense of responsibility toward your work. What has become of it?"
"I have it still. I am not slighting my work by taking time to build myself into better shape for it."
"But you will simply stagnate here!" querulously. "You are becoming slack already. You let your watch run down."
The doctor laughed.
"If many of my patients could do the same without worry they would not need a doctor. Half of the nervous trouble of the age can be ultimately traced to watches which won't run down. Leisure—unhurried leisure—that is what we want. We've got to have it!"
"Piffle! I shall hear you talk about inviting your soul next."