“Oh, Barry, how wonderful! How perfectly wonderful!” cried Paula in an ecstasy of delight.
In that farewell there were tears and smiles, but more smiles than tears. The last to touch their hands was Paula. She managed to draw them apart from the others, with her eyes glistening with unaccustomed tears. “You deserve each other. Phyllis,” she whispered, alternately shaking and kissing her, “there was a day when I would have fought you for him, until Neil came. Barry, you dear boy, you may kiss me goodbye, and oh, may you both live forever.”
“Goodbye, dear Paula,” cried Phyllis. “You have been so lovely to me from the very first. I shall never, never forget you.”
“Goodbye, Paula,” said Barry, “dearest of all dear friends.”
She stooped to steady the canoe, while Phyllis stepped to her place in the bow.
“Goodbye to all of you. God love you and keep you all,” said Barry.
He took his paddle and stepped into the canoe, Paula still stooping over it to keep it steady.
“Dear, dear Barry,” she whispered, and for the first time her tears fell. “Goodbye! Goodbye!”
Together the little company stood watching them away, Phyllis in the bow, not paddling, sat with her face toward them, Barry swinging his paddle with graceful, powerful strokes, until just at a curve of the shore, where some birches overhung the water, he swung the canoe half round, and with paddle held Voyageur fashion in salute, they passed out of sight.