"I wonder when it began," she whispered, "—at the ball-game—or on Fifth Avenue—or when I saw you here? It seems to me as if I always had been in love with you."
Outside in the ocean, the breeze stiffened and the perfume was tinged with salt.
Lying back against his knees, her eyes fixed dreamily on the stars, she murmured:
"Stirrups will be surprised."
"What are you talking about down there all by yourself?" he whispered, bending over her.
She looked up into his eyes. Suddenly her own[60] filled; and she put up both arms, linking them around his neck.
And so the Orange Puppy sailed away into the viewless, formless, starry mystery of all romance.
After a silence the young novelist, who had been poking the goldfish, said slowly: "That's pretty poor fiction, Athalie, but, as a matter of simple fact and inartistic truth, recording sentimental celerity, it stands unequalled."
"Straight facts make poor fiction," remarked Duane.