Tamea
Mellenger folded the letter and put it back in his pocket. Dan hid his face in his hands and wept.
“Poor child,” Mellenger murmured. “She has never heard that pity is akin to love—that she stirred in you all the profound pity and tenderness of your naturally kind and chivalrous heart. I wouldn’t feel so badly about it if I were you, Dan. You weep now because your love lies dead and you have killed it. You merely made a very human mistake. So did Tamea. But she realizes it and has the courage to confess it. Old son, your romance is at an end.”
“I shall not abandon her, Mel,” Dan cried brokenly. “My unhappiness shall not be paid off against hers. She’s too tremendously fine, too noble.”
“That is true. She is too tremendously fine, too noble, to permit you to dramatize yourself for her sake. There is only one sacrifice necessary here, and Tamea is making it—gladly, without regret and all because she possesses in full measure a love so wonderful, so glorious that no man can ever possibly understand it or appreciate it. There will be no pandering to your ego, my son. You are no longer infatuated with Tamea, she knows it and you might as well acknowledge it. Heroics are quite unnecessary. Tamea, I take it, does not desire them and I shall not permit them.”
“But Maisie. What of her, Mel?”
“Well, when she received this letter she sent for me and gave it to me to read. She knew I was your friend so she sought my counsel. I asked her pointblank if she loved you and she said she did. I asked her why she had permitted you to escape and she told me. I think I can understand her point of view. Then I asked her if she had any conception of your point of view in this triangle and she said she thought she understood enough of it to forgive you. I know you rather well, Dan, and I tried to paint for Maisie a word picture of you as I know you. I told her that you had never been truly in love with Tamea but rather in love with love.
“It is your nature to idealize everything. You yearned for a high romance and Tamea was a romantic figure. She appealed to you physically and romantically. She aroused your pity, she stirred you and set your soul afire, and neither of you knew that it was the sort of conflagration that burns itself out and leaves only a heap of ashes—ashes of sorrow and regret. I tried to make Maisie see that it was largely her fault. She had declined to reach forth and possess you as Tamea, in her primitive innocence, did not hesitate to do.
“I asked her if the memory of this escapade of yours would cloud her future happiness, if she should marry you, and she said she thought she could manage to forget it.” Mellenger paused and gazed out to sea through half closed eyes. “As a matter of fact,” he continued, “there is not the slightest necessity that anybody in our world need know what has happened. You have merely been knocking around the isles of the South Sea, painting and enjoying yourself. Nobody knows except Tamea, Maisie, you, Hackett and myself—and none of us will ever tell.”
“But, Mel, Maisie refused to marry me. If she had, this would never have happened.”