When they had rounded the islet, said Eleanor: "I am sure you must be tired, Mr. Pomeroy. Suppose you ship your oars and let the tide float us gently down."
"I am not in the least tired; but, being a good boy, I like to do as I am bidden."
Cunning Gerald knew that by floating down with the stream he should have half an hour more of Eleanor's society than if he had used his oars ever so gently.
"Going back is not nearly so nice as going up stream," he remarked.
"What makes you think so?"
"Because our voyage will so soon be at an end."
"But, when you have landed me, there will be no objection to your having the boat out for as many hours as you like."
"And make a water hermit of myself. I scarcely think that I am sufficiently fond of my own company to care for that. I like solitude, but I must have some one to share it with me. The sweetest solitude is that where two people, whose tastes and sympathies are in accord, shut themselves out from the rest of the world (as you and I are shut out on this silent highway) to find in the society of each other a truer and more complete satisfaction than in aught else this earth can afford."
"Is not that a rather selfish view to take of life and its duties?" asked Eleanor.
"Is it not possible to live in the world and yet be not of it?" he returned--"to do our daily tasks there, and yet have an inner sanctuary to flee to, of which no one but ourselves shall possess the key, and against whose walls the noise and turmoil of the world shall dash themselves in vain?"