“Ben, old fellow, get hold of yourself!”
“I feel like jumping over and swimming for it,” he said miserably.
“To-morrow you’ll be thanking God from the bottom of your heart,” I said, linking my arm under his. “Do you remember once when you came between me and making a fool of myself, and how we fought and rolled on the ground? Well, my turn, now. It’s a queer world, and we’ve both got to grin and bear things. But it isn’t a question of love, Ben. It’s just been slavery, weak, unnatural, humiliating slavery. Better now than later!”
“Right! Sorry I made such an ass of myself. It’s over, and, David, that’s the last I’ll ever see of her.”
But I am not so sure of that.
* * * * *
The letter was crumpled in my hand. To have given courage to Ben gave me a sort of courage, which I sadly needed. I did not at once open and read it. I was afraid. I was afraid of a hundred nameless imagined fears, but most of all of the sure reaction I knew must come in her woman’s heart, once the irresistible spell of our coming together had been broken. I went below, into the saloon, and laid her letter before me on the desk. Then, with a sudden inspiration, I found a sheet of paper and wrote:
Sailing down the Harbor
Bernoline, dear:
Your letter is here, before my eyes: and I am still afraid to open it. I shall not read it until I have written this. For I feel already what you will say. Bernoline, no matter what the obstacle which stands between us, it can alter nothing. While you live and I live, we are powerless to change what fate has laid upon us. As for me, just to know your love is to me so great a thing that if I had to choose again with open eyes, I would choose all I have suffered and all that may come to me, all the heart-burnings and all the daily, hourly longing, the cruelty of separation,—all just to have seen your eyes at parting. Be to each other what is right that we should be,—the rest is beyond our knowledge. I have strength for everything but one thing,—not to hear from you again.
David.
Then I took up her letter, and read: