She would not look at me. I had her right forearm and hand in the grip of my hot, trembling hands. Her left elbow rested on the iron railing of the balcony, her chin on her hand. And her eyes roved off over the roofs of the Chinese houses, over the walls and trees of the Legation Quarter, off southward toward the temple of Heaven that stood somewhere there behind the trees and the starlit sky above it.
More and more my thoughts were slipping out of control. I struggled to hold them, but could not. I had never in my life felt like this.
“You must not let the fact that I love you confuse your sense of justice,” I went on, quite as if she and I had long known and admitted my love for her. “That is another matter altogether. Except in this—I know now that as long as I live I shall want to help you. This is quite beyond your control, or mine. It simply happens to be so. And it does seem to me that since it is so, you can at least let me help you to the extent that is practically and impersonally fair.”
It was curious how the mere utterance of those three words, “I love you,” cleared my mind. It explained everything. It relieved me by extricating me from all uncertainty of thought and feeling. It thrilled me, deeply and solemnly. I wanted to say it over and over and over. I wanted to take her into my arms and whisper it into one ear and then into the other. I wanted to whisper it to the stars up there, the stars that have heard so much. I wanted to go over to the big hotel in the Quarter, where there would be bright lights and tourists and gilded military folk and gay ladies, and say it so that all might hear and share the thrill of it.
My talk dwindled out. What part had more argument in this? My grip on her arm relaxed; I held only to her unresponsive hand, and leaned on the railing beside her.
For a long, long time we were still there. Then, finally she withdrew her hand.
I looked at her and saw that her eyes were shining, and there were tears on her cheek.
“Oh,” she murmured, “why—why—could n't we have gone on!”
“You don't mean that we can't go on!” said I.
She looked full at me, and inclined her head. To-day she has had more color, her face has not had so much of the worn, tired look. But now, by the half-light that fell on her from the window, I saw that it had all returned. She was very sad, very tired.