All that remained to seal his brotherhood was to forget even that he had found it, to forget even that he was dead, to walk the way blankly, blindly. All of his dead life remained for doing that. The battle had been waged!...
It was the New Year—the New Year, and Quincy welcome in it.
The rising sun flamed into his room.
He pulled down the blind, shutting out the sun.
Then he went to bed in the made, swart shadows, and fell asleep.
EPILOGUE
There was no sequel with Clarice. She had expressed her will and pleasure, concerning him; together with her fears. She had gone out with the old. For Quincy’s senses understood what his relation with her called for; and all of that was abdicated; and that alone was needed. Had he gone to her now, it must have been with knowledge of the dead burden she had no power to bear, and no heart to quicken. To this conclusion, over and again, she had expressed herself. And to this end, Quincy honored her word. For within his state lay the bar to a more active course and to a clearer vision.
They did meet, however.
The adverse currents of a great street—relentless and cold and varicolored—threw them upon each other. The impact stopped them, while the flood went on. And the obtrusive instinct of their first glance lighted in each the farce of their words, the irony even of their stopping. The tearing shuffle of the crowd was the true note. Athwart it, their attempts to reach each other were refracted, shredded, lost. He held her gloved hand a moment, he looked into her eyes; and then he dropped both hold and gaze. It was the final act of letting-go. She joined her current; his swept him on....