I replied that it was very uncertain.
"And short, too, when you come to think of it. It's very short, too, Miss Hungerford."
"Oh, yes," I answered, "very."
"Ahem! It was—it was dreadful sudden, somehow," said Lovell.
"I suppose so, Mr. Barlow," I replied gravely; "great and unexpected joys are sometimes said to be as benumbing in their first effects as griefs coming in the same way."
"I think so," said Lovell. "Ahem! I think so, Miss Hungerford, I do, certainly."
Madeline joined me at the door, and I bade Lovell good-night.
We clambered down the cliffs, walking a little while along on the beach on our way homeward.
It was growing dark, and the voice of the ocean was infinitely mournful and sublime. No wonder, I thought, that life had seemed very short and uncertain to Lovell as he stood in the door listening to the waves.
What a little thing it seemed indeed, comparatively—this life with its fears and hopes, its poor idle jests and fleeting shows.