Part 17 (2/2)
Moya smiled. ”Once we were serious--ages ago. Do you remember?”
”Do I remember!”
”Well? You are you, and I am I, still.”
”Yes; and as full of fateful surprises for each other.”
”I bar 'fateful'! That word has the true taint of morbidness.”
”But you can't 'bar' fate. Listen: this is a supposing, you know.
Suppose that an accident had happened to our leader on the way home--to your Lieutenant Winslow, we'll say”--
”_My_ lieutenant!”
”Your father's--the regiment's--Lieutenant Winslow 'of ours.' Suppose we had brought him back in a state to need a surgeon's help; and without a word to any one he should get up and walk out of the hospital with his hurts not healed, and no one knew why, or where he had gone? There would be a stir about it, would there not? And if such a poor spectre of a bridegroom as I were allowed to join the search, no one would think it strange, or call it a slight to his bride if the fellow went?”
”I take your case,” said Moya with a beaming look. ”You want to go after that poor man who suffered with you.”
”Who went with us to save us from our own headstrong folly, and would have died there alone”--
”Yes; oh, yes!--before you begin to think about yourself, or me. Because he is n.o.body 'of ours,' and no one seems to feel responsible, and we go on talking and laughing just the same!”
”Do they talk of this downstairs?”
”To-night they were talking--oh, with such philosophy! But how came you to know it?”
Paul did not answer this question. ”Then”--he drew a long breath,--”then you could bear it, dear?--the comment, even if they called it a slight to you and a piece of quixotic lunacy? Others will not take my case, remember.”
”What others?”
”They will say: 'Why doesn't he send a better man? He is no trailer.' It is true. Money might find him and bring him back, but all the money in the world could not teach him to trust his friends. There is a misunderstanding here which is too bitter to be borne. It is hard to explain,--the intimacy that grows up between men placed as we were. But as soon as help reached us, the old lines were drawn. I belonged with the officers, he with the men. We could starve together, but we could not eat together. He accepted it--put himself on that basis at once.
He would not come up here as the guest of the Post. He is done with us because he thinks we are done with him. And he knows that I must know his occupation is gone. He will never guide nor pack a mule again.”
”Your mother and my father, they will understand. What do the others matter?”
”I must tell you, dear, that I do not propose to tell them--especially them--why I go. For I am going. I must go! There are reasons I cannot explain.” He sighed, and looked wildly at Moya, whose smile was becoming mechanical. ”I hate the excuse, but it will have to be said that I go for a change--for my health. My health! Great G.o.d! But it's 'orders,'
dear.”
”Your orders are my orders. You are never going anywhere again without me,” said Moya slowly. Her smile was gone. She stood up and faced him, pale and beautiful. He rose, too, and stooped above her, taking her hands and gazing into her full blue eyes arched like the eyes of angels.
”I thought she was a girl! But she is a woman,” he said in a voice of caressing wonder. ”A woman, and not afraid!”
”I am afraid. I will not be left--I will not be left again! Oh, you won't take me, even when I offer myself to you!”
”Don't--don't tempt me!” Paul caught her to him with a groan. ”You don't know me well enough to be afraid of _me!_”
”You! You will not let me know you.”
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