"Escape? No! All that has once happened sets its mark on us, and follows us like a shadow; it will overtake us some day wherever we may go—I have learned that at least, and learned it in a way that is not easy to forget."
"You—have you too…?" Again she felt that inexpressible tenderness, the impulse to draw nearer to him. How much they would have to say to each other—the thoughts and lessons of all those years! She knew it well enough for her own part, and from his voice, too, she knew it was the same. And yet, it could not be. They seemed so very near each other, but for all that wide apart; near in the things of the past, but sundered inevitably in the present. Their hearts must be closed to each other—it showed in their eyes, and nothing could alter that.
… What happened after she hardly knew. Had they talked, or only thought together? She remembered only how he had risen at last and grasped her hand.
"Forgive me," he said, with a strange tremor in his voice, as if the word held infinitely much in itself.
And she could only stammer confusedly in return: "Forgive…!"
She hardly knew what it was they had asked each other to forgive, only that it was something that had to come, and was good to say, ending and healing something out of the past, freeing them at last each from the other….
One thing she remembered, just as he was going. She had felt she must say it then—a sincere and earnest thought that had often been in her mind.
"Olof—I have heard about your wife. And I am so glad she is—as she is. It was just such a wife you needed … it was not everyone could have filled her place…."
Had she said it aloud? She fancied so—or was it perhaps only her eyes that had spoken? It might be so. One thing was certain—he had understood it, every word—she had read so much in his eyes.
And then he had gone away—hurriedly, as one who has stayed too long.