Sheila could not but note the difference between the other man and Winfield. There was every opportunity for observation in both cases. Each inly acknowledged that the other was perfection physically. Each wished to be able to observe the other’s soul in equal completeness of display. But that power was denied them.
It would have served them little to know each other’s souls, since happiness in love is not a question of individual perfections, but of their combination and what results from it. Fire and water are excellent in their place, but brought together, the result is familiar—either the water changes the flame to sodden ashes, or the flame changes the water to steam. Both lose their qualities, change unrecognizably.
In any case, Winfield courted Sheila with all the impetuous stubbornness of his nature. He had no visible rivals to fight, but the affair was not denied the added charm of danger.
One blistering day, when all of the populace that could slid off the hot land into the water like half-baked amphibians, Sheila and Winfield plunged into the nearest fringe of surf. The beach was like Broadway when the matinées let out. They swam to the float. It was as crowded as a seal-rock with sirens, sea-leopards, sea-cows, walruses, dugongs, and manatees. There was no room for Sheila till an obliging faun gallantly offered her his seat and dived from the raft more graciously than gracefully, for he smacked the water flatly in what is known as a belly-buster or otherwise. He nearly swamped her in his back-wash.
She felt a longing for the outer solitudes and, when she had rested and breathed a few times, she struck out for the open sea beyond the ropes. Winfield followed her gaily and they reveled in the life of mer-man and mer-girl till suddenly she realized that she was tired.
Forgetting where she was, she attempted to stand up. She thrust her feet down into a void. There is hardly a more hideous sensation, or a more terrifying, for an inexpert swimmer. She went under with a gasp and came up choking.
Winfield was just diving into a big wave and did not see her. The same wave caught Sheila by the back of her head and held her face down, then swept on, leaving her strangling and smitten into a panic. She struck out for shore with all awkwardness, as if robbed of experience with the water.
Winfield turned to her, and sang, “A life on the bounding waves for me.” An ugly, snarling breaker whelmed her again, and a third found her unready and cowering before its toppling wall. She called Winfield by his first name for the first time:
“Bret, I can’t get back.”
He crept to her side with all his speed, and spoke soothing words: “You poor child! of course you can.”