Then she heard him get up. She heard him push his chair up to the table, and then for a minute he stood there. She wanted to turn toward him; she wanted to say something—do something. But she had no power.
She saw him lay an envelope upon her desk. She heard him walking away. She knew, numbly, that his footsteps were not steady. She knew that he had stopped; she was sure that he was looking back. But still she had no power.
And then she heard him go.
Even then she went on with her work; she finished her “take” and laid down her pencil. It was finished now—and he had gone. Finished?—Gone? She was tearing open the envelope of the letter.
This was what she read:
“Little dictionary sprite, sunshine vender, and girl to be loved, if I were a free man I would say to you—Come, little one, and let us learn of love. Let us learn of it, not as one learns from dictionaries, but let us learn from the morning glow and the evening shades. But Miss Noah, maker of dictionaries and creeper into hearts, the bound must not call to the free. They might fittingly have used my name as one of the synonyms under that word Failure, but I trust not under Coward.
“And now, you funny little Miss Noah from the University of Chicago, don't I know that your heart is blazing forth the assurance that you don't care for any of those things—the world, people, common sense—that you want just love? They made a grand failure of you out at your university; they taught you philosophy and they taught you Greek, and they've left you just as much the woman as women were five thousand years ago. Oh, I know all about you—you little girl whose hair tried so hard to be red. Your soul touched mine as we sat there writing words—words—words, the very words in which men try to tell things, and can't—and I know all about what you would do. But you shall not do it. Dear little copy maker, would a man standing out on the end of a slippery plank have any right to cry to someone on the shore—'Come out here on this plank with me?' If he loved the someone on the shore, would he not say instead—'Don't get on this plank?' Me get off the plank—come with you to the shore—you are saying? But you see, dear, you only know slippery planks as viewed from the shore—God grant you may never know them any other way!
“It was you, was it not, who wrote our definition of happiness? Yes, I remember the day you did it. You were so interested; your cheeks grew so very red, and you pulled and pulled at your wavy hair. You said it was such an important definition. And so it is, Miss Noah, quite the most important of all. And on the page of life, Miss Noah, may happiness be written large and unblurred for you. It is because I cannot help you write it that I turn away. I want at least to leave the page unspoiled.
“I carry a picture of you. I shall carry it always. You are sitting before a fireplace, and I think of that fireplace as symbolising the warmth and care and tenderness and the safety that will surround you. And sometimes as you sit there let a thought of me come for just a minute, Miss Noah—not long enough nor deep enough to bring you any pain. But only think—I brought him happiness after he believed all happiness had gone. He was so grateful for that light which came after he thought the darkness had settled down. It will light his way to the end.
“We've come to Z, and it's good-bye. There is one thing I can give you without hurting you,—the hope, the prayer, that life may be very, very good to you.”