Strange that Jim, who had avowed to Horatia that Mrs. Hubbell was possibly dangerous and who had himself so few illusions, should have been listening to her so seriously and so intently. She did not press the point but began to talk of Horatia—of her beauty, her grace, her mind, and Langley drank it all in. And the lake grew a darker grey as he bathed in the thoughts of the woman he loved and the woman who watched him saw that he was so far away from her that she grew heedless about her own expressions and let them grow a little more hard and bitter and angry. At last she jumped to her feet.
“Getting dark, Jimmy. We must go.”
Jim rose. He had been having a delightful time for that last half hour and was ready to go—go back to Horatia.
“I’m glad you like her so much, Rose,” he said gratefully and awkwardly.
“I admire her more than I can tell you,” said Rose, “and if she would let me love her I would be happy indeed.”
Langley did not answer that. He gave her his hand to help her over the rocks and they went down the deserted country road. In the last stretch before they came in sight of the station he felt her hand suddenly hot in his and as he turned she put her hands on his shoulders.
“Let me kiss you once, Jimmy boy,” she asked, “just for good luck.”
The name woke a host of memories in him which he would not have willingly called forth. He bent his head a little to her swift caress and then they went on, his mind back, uncontrollably back, in the past. He walked in reverie, and she helped him a little in it. What they talked of now was those early days of her married life when Jim and Jack Hubbell had spent long evenings with her, the three of them in ardent conversation—or so it had seemed then to them. Skillfully Mrs. Hubbell recreated those past days, playing now on chords of sentiment, now on humorous notes, and Jim slid back into the past with her. On the train and on the way to her home she held up the conversation constantly, always maintaining the effect that she wanted of reviving a happy memory about to be relegated to the past forever. It was at her own door, when, after vainly urging him to come in, she gave him her hand in farewell and said:
“I wonder if I dare ask you something.”
It may have been because he was so pleased at the happy turn she had given her melancholy, but in any case his smile was friendly and promising.