I was dazed, but she went on.
"What does the ceremony matter? We love each other. Isn't that the real marriage? It's more; it's an ideal. We'll both be free to go if we wish. There will be no bonds but those of love. Is not that beautiful, two people cleaving together for love's sake, living for each other, sacrificing for each other, yet with no man-made law to tell them: 'This must ye do'? Oh, stay, stay!"
Her arms were round my neck. The grey eyes were full of pleading. The sweet lips had the old, pathetic droop. I yielded to the empery of love.
"Well," I said, "we will go on awhile, on one condition—that by-and-bye you marry me."
"Yes, I will, I will; I promise. If you don't tire of me; if you are sure beyond all doubt you will never regret it, then I will marry you with the greatest joy in the world."
So it came about that I stayed.
CHAPTER VIII
In this infernal irony of an existence why do the good things of life always come when we no longer have the same appetite to enjoy them? The year following, in which Berna and I kept house, was not altogether a happy one. Somehow we had both just missed something. We had suffered too much to recover our poise very easily. We were sick, not in body, but in mind. The thought of her terrible experience haunted her. She was as sensitive as the petal of a delicate flower, and often would I see her lips quiver and a look of pain come into her eyes. Then I knew of what she was thinking. I knew, and I, too, suffered.
I tried to make her forget, yet I could not succeed; and even in my most happy moments there was always a shadow, the shadow of Locasto; there was always a fear, the fear of his return. Yes, it seemed at times as if we were two unfortunates, as if our happiness had come too late, as if our lives were irretrievably shipwrecked.