“You cannot leave me utterly. I am not strong enough for that! Anything else—but not that!”
“Nor I.” Her eyes filled with tears and then, at last, through the tears, the smile came bravely forth. “Until the end of the war, then. And now—” She stopped, looked at me, and shook her head slowly.
“So soon?”
“It is best not to try ourselves beyond our strength,” she said. “But—we will not go too fast.”
I do not remember much what she said. For I was silent, once the great test passed, all at once weak and rebellious. She spoke to me, recalling our first meeting, speaking of the home she had found. My head was turning. All the complications, all the tragic incidents of our meeting and parting, the fatality that lay between us; all was nothing to the knowledge of the love that had looked at me out of the great dark eyes. My instincts revolted. I could not believe, I would not believe that this was the end. Somewhere, somehow, the future would be ours, if we had to wait—for twenty years!
We came to the end and, as I stood, all choked up, she took my hand and laid it against her heart—a moment.
“Mon ami, you will be there, always.”
The light in her eyes is still before me as I write and the dear face, transformed with all the pure happiness of a child.
“And now—” she began reluctantly.
“No—no! Not that word!” I blurted out.