“I sometimes doubt whether I am much changed either. What is it changes a man? His body grows, and he fills his memory with good and bad. But only so much of what he learns stays with him as naturally belongs to him; the knowledge he gains is only the confirmation of what he knew before. A word is not changed by magnifying it.”
“But if you put in another syllable—?”
“Yes, then it becomes different: either more or less than it was before, or, may be, nonsense. But it is not learning that can put a new syllable into a man.”
“What does, then?”
Philip did not immediately reply; but by-and-by he said, “I believe Providence meant our brains only to show us what fools we are. At least, that’s the most mine have done for me. The more fuel we put into it, and the more light it gives out, the more clearly does it reveal to us our smallness and poverty.”
“Perhaps—if we turn the light against ourselves. But clever people generally prefer to throw light upon the smallness and poverty of others.”
Again Philip paused for several moments; then he said suddenly, his eyes darkening, “By God, were I to be tried for my life, I would not choose you for my judge!”
They were sitting together on the roots of one of the oaks. Marion turned her head slowly and encountered Philip’s look. She put out her hand and touched his, saying, “Forgive me.”
He grasped her hand and held it. At first she made a movement as if to withdraw it; but, meeting his eyes again, she let it remain. She looked away; a long breath, intermittently drawn, filled her bosom. The contact of her hand, sensitive and alive, was more significant than a kiss to Philip. He did not venture to move or to speak; thoughts flew quickly through his mind—thoughts that he could not analyze; but they were born of such emotions as joy, eagerness, self-distrust, the desire to be nobler and better than he had ever been: a feeling of tender pathos. A voice in his heart kept repeating “Marion! Marion! Marion!” with a sense that everything womanly and sacred was implied in that name. He felt, also, that a sort of accident had brought him nearer to her than he had as yet a right to come: that he must wait, and give her time.
They got up, at last, by a mutual impulse, after how long a time they knew not. They had spoken no words. They looked at each other for a moment, and each beheld in the other something that had not been visible before: there was a certain surprise and softness in the look. The touch of the hands was over; but they seemed to be encircled by a secret sympathy that sweetly secluded them from all foreign approach. The nearness was spiritual, and demanded a degree of physical severance. They moved along, with a space between them, but intimately conscious of each other.