"And—" Edith's voice was almost a whisper.
The Time Has Come
"The time has come. I may have found her only to lose her again, but she's mine—for to-day."
He filled two small glasses, and, solemnly, they drank. The light mood vanished as surely as though they had been in a church, at some unwonted communion. Behind the leafy screen, Rosemary trembled and shook. She felt herself sharply divided into a dual personality. One of her was serene and calm, able to survey the situation unemotionally, as though it were something that did not concern her at all. The other was a deeply passionate, loving woman, who had just seen her life's joy taken from her for ever.
Alden, leaning back against the rock near which they sat, was looking at Edith as a man looks at but one woman in all his life. To Rosemary, trembling and cold, it someway brought a memory of her father's face, in the faded picture. At the thought, she clenched her hands tightly and compressed her lips. So much she had, made hers eternally by a grave. No one could take from her the thrilling sense of kinship with those who had given her life.
Edith looked out upon the river. Her face was wistful and as appealing as a child's. "Found," she repeated, "though only to lose again."
"Perhaps not," he answered, hopefully. "Wait and see."
Never Again
"Life is made of waiting," she returned, sadly—"woman's life always is." Then with a characteristically quick change of mood, she added, laughingly: "I know a woman who says that all her life, before she was married, she was waiting for her husband, and that since her marriage, she has noticed no difference."
Alden smiled at the swift anti-climax, then his face grew grave again. He packed the few dishes in the basket, rinsed the wine glasses in the river, brought them back, and gave one to Edith.