“Whether or not you become famous as a writer,” she said slowly, “won’t make any difference in the least. It’s you I care for, Steve; you as you are now and nothing more.” The voice paused but the eyes did not shift. “As for the future, Steve man, I can’t promise nor can you. To do so would be to lie, and I won’t lie. I say I love you; you as you are. If anything ever should come between us, should, I say—you suggested it and—persist—it will be because of a change in you yourself.” For the second time she halted; then she smiled. “I think that’s all there is to say,” she completed.
“All!” With a buoyancy unfeigned the man swung out of the hammock upon his feet. “That’s just the beginning. You’re just getting under way, Elice.” 86
“No,” peremptorily; “all—for the present at least. It’s four o’clock of the afternoon, you know, and the neighbors have eyes like—Look at the sun shine!... You’ve scared away the wren too, and the brood is hungry. Besides it’s time to begin dinner. Cooks shouldn’t be hindered ever.” She turned toward the door decisively. “You may stay if you don’t bother again,” she smiled over her shoulder. “Meanwhile there’s a new ‘Life’ and a July ‘Century,’—you know where,” and with a final smile she was gone.
CHAPTER V
CERTAINTY
Four months had drifted by; again the University was in full swing.
Of an evening in late October at this time, in the common living-room which joined the two private rooms in the suite occupied by himself and Darley Roberts, Stephen Armstrong was alone. It was now nearly eleven o’clock, and he had come in directly after dinner, ample time to have prepared his work for the next day; but as yet he had made no move in that direction. On the roll-top desk, with its convenient drop light, was an armful of reference books and two late scientific magazines. They were still untouched, however, bound tight by the strap with which they had been carried.
But one sign of his prolonged presence was visible in the room. That, a loose pile of manuscript alternately hastily scribbled and painfully exact, told of the varying moods under which it had been produced;—that and a tiny pile of 88 cigarette stumps in the nearby ash-tray, some scarcely lit and others burned to a tiny stump, which had become the manuscripts’ invariable companion.