“I know what he meant,” said I. “I know now.”
A word to a brother who may have come under the spell of the unquiet Lady Neurasthenia.
The formula was true. Even though gropingly at times, the physicians of the walled cities had put their fingers upon the specific medicament.
And so for the exercise one is referred to good Doctor Tatum on Black Oak Mountain—take the road to your right at the Methodist meeting house in the pine-grove.
Absolute rest and exercise!
What rest more remedial than to sit with Amaryllis in the shade, and, with a sixth sense, read the wordless Theocritan idyl of the gold-bannered blue mountains marching orderly into the dormitories of the night?
XV.
OCTOBER AND JUNE
The Captain gazed gloomily at his sword that hung upon the wall. In the closet near by was stored his faded uniform, stained and worn by weather and service. What a long, long time it seemed since those old days of war’s alarms!
And now, veteran that he was of his country’s strenuous times, he had been reduced to abject surrender by a woman’s soft eyes and smiling lips. As he sat in his quiet room he held in his hand the letter he had just received from her—the letter that had caused him to wear that look of gloom. He re-read the fatal paragraph that had destroyed his hope.
In declining the honour you have done me in asking me to be your wife, I feel that I ought to speak frankly. The reason I have for so doing is the great difference between our ages. I like you very, very much, but I am sure that our marriage would not be a happy one. I am sorry to have to refer to this, but I believe that you will appreciate my honesty in giving you the true reason.