“Oh no; that is the worst of it. But I have said too much; I have said a great deal more than I ought. But you must excuse it: I am an old woman. I am not very well, and I suppose it's that that makes me talk so much.”
She rose from her chair, and I, perforce, rose from mine and made a movement towards her.
“No, no,” she said, “I don't need any help. You must come again soon and see us, and show that you've forgotten what I've said.” She gave me her hand, and I could not help bending over it and kissing it. She gave a little, pathetic whimper. “Oh, I know I've said the most dreadful things to you.”
“You haven't said anything that takes your friendship from me, Mrs. Gray, and that is what I care for.” My own eyes filled with tears—I do not know why—and I groped my way from the room. Without seeing any one in the obscurity of the hallway, where I found myself, I was aware of some one there, by that sort of fine perception which makes us know the presence of a spirit.
“You are going?” a whisper said. “Why are you going?” And Eveleth had me by the hand and was drawing me gently into the dim drawing-room that opened from the place. “I don't know all my mother has been saying to you. I had to let her say something; she thought she ought. I knew you would know how to excuse it.”
“Oh, my dearest!” I said, and why I said this I do not know, or how we found ourselves in each other's arms.
“What are we doing?” she murmured.
“You don't believe I am an impostor, an illusion, a visionary?” I besought her, straining her closer to my heart.
“I believe in you, with all my soul!” she answered.
We sat down, side by side, and talked long. I did not go away the whole day. With a high disdain of convention, she made me stay. Her mother sent word that she would not be able to come to dinner, and we were alone together at table, in an image of what our united lives might be. We spent the evening in that happy interchange of trivial confidences that lovers use in symbol of the unutterable raptures that fill them. We were there in what seemed an infinite present, without a past, without a future.