'Some other man!
.....
.....'
He grinds his teeth. It is some minutes before he can regain sufficient command over himself to answer with a tolerable appearance of composure:
'You are right; I will send for them!'
A little sighing gust has risen; sighing for him perhaps, he thinks, with a flash of imaginative self-pity, as he watches its soft antics among the lily-like flowers, and its light ruffling of Peggy's gown. It has mistaken her for one of the flowers! What foolish fancies are careering through his hot brain! There can be none in hers, or how could she be holding out such a cool hand and lifting such a suave calm look to his?
'I must be going,' she says, speaking in a rather lower voice than is her wont; 'good-bye! Since'—a wavering smile breaking tremulously over her face—'since you are so determined to go downhill, I suppose I dare not say that I hope our roads will ever meet again!'
Her hand slides out of his unreturning clasp. He feels that if he keep that soft prisoner for one instant, he must keep it through eternity.
'Good-bye!' he says.
He would like to bid God bless her; but he can no more do it than Macbeth could say 'Amen.' What right has he to bid God bless her? Will God be more likely to send her a benison for his unworthy asking? So he lets her go unblessed.