“No, Mr. Spencer. I intended to, at one time. I came to this country to make a home, and as I was rather a long time about it, she married some one else.”
Clayton caught the echo of an old pain in Buckham's repressed voice. Buckham, too! Was there in the life of every man some woman tragedy? Buckham, sitting alone in his west window and looking toward the sunset, Buckham had his memories.
“She lost her only son at Neuve Chapelle,” Buckham was saying quietly. “In a way, it was as tho I had lost a boy. She never cared for the man she married. He was a fine boy, sir. I—you may remember the night I was taken ill in the pantry.”
“Is her husband still living?”
“No, Mr. Spencer.”
“Do you ever think of going back and finding her?”
“I have, sir. But I don't know. I like to remember her as she used to be. I have some beautiful memories. And I think sometimes it is better to live on memories. They are more real than—well, than reality, sir.”
Long after Buckham had withdrawn, Clayton paced the floor of the library. Was Buckham right? Was the real life of a man his mental life? Was any love so great as a man's dream of love? Peace was on the way. Soon this nightmare of war would be over, and in the great awakening love would again take the place of hate. Love of man for man, of nation for nation. Peace and the things of peace. Time to live. Time to hope, with the death-cloud gone. Time to work and time to play. Time to love a woman and cherish her for the rest of life, if only—
His failure with Natalie had lost him something. She had cost him his belief in himself. Her last words had crystallized his own sense of failure.
“I admit all your good qualities, Clay. Heaven knows they are evident enough. But you are the sort people admire. They don't love you. They never will.”