He bent over her, as if he would take her in his arms.
She was unconscious. I felt tempted to put her there. I knew I loved her as he could never love—yet I pitied him the more for that.
"Tell her," he whispered, "tell her, when she shall have forgotten this—as I hope she will—that for this hour at least I loved her; that losing her I am liable to love her long,—so we shall never meet again. I shall never cease to be grateful to the Providence that threw you in my way—after to-night. To-night I could curse it and my conscience with a right good will." With an effort he straightened himself. "You can afford to forgive me," he said, "for I—I envy you with all my heart."—And he was gone.
I heard his voice as he spoke to the waiter outside. I listened to his step as he descended the stairs. He had passed out of our life forever.
That was years ago.
She has long been dead.
He was not to blame if the sunshine that danced in music out of the eyes of the woman I loved never quite came back again. We were, all the same, happy together in our way.
He was not to blame if it was written in the big book of Fate that it should be his heart, and not mine, that should read the song she bore in her soul.
Something must be sacrificed for Art. We sacrificed our first illusions—and the Song he read will sing on when even Rodriguez is but a tradition.