Part 29 (2/2)

”You had three little freckles high up on your cheek, what became of them?” he demanded. All at once his mood changed again. ”All the years I've been without you!... I saw a picture of you in a magazine three years ago in Alaska. I came near writing.”

”You should have. What were you doing there?”

”Promoting Engineer, Alaska, Russia, Mexico.” He began a gesture to include the whole round of the mining world, but left off to take my hand again. ”The world _is_ round,” he declared, as though he had somewhat doubted it. ”It brings us back again to the old starting points.”

”They're always the same, I suppose, the places we set out from; but we ... we are never the same.”

”Is that a warning?” He looked at me, checked for a moment.

”Only a plat.i.tude.” I had thrown it out instinctively against his engulfing manner, against everything that rose up in me to a.s.sure me that nothing whatever had changed, that it would never change. The life of the London streets streamed around us; crossing Piccadilly Circus we were held up with the traffic; the roar of the city islanded us like a sea.

”I suppose you know where we are going?” I suggested in one of the checked intervals.

”To your hotel; Mrs. Shane gave me the address. I told her we were old friends. You mustn't be surprised if you find she expects us to have gone to school together. I wanted to get away where we could talk.” I gave him an a.s.senting smile. Still neither of us showed any disposition to begin. He took off his hat in the carriage and ran his fingers through his hair. About the temples it had gone gray a little. Now and then he gave a short contented laugh as a man will, put suddenly at ease.

”I'm glad you kept the old name, Olivia Lattimore ... Olivia. I shouldn't have found you without.”

”You knew I had lost my husband.”

”I read that in the magazine. There's where I have the advantage of you.” He dropped his light banter for a soberer tone. ”My wife died two years ago.” We were silent after that until the fact had been put behind us by a s.p.a.ce of time.

I don't know why London seems a more homey place than New York. It has been going on so long, perhaps, is so steeped in the essential essence of human living, and the buildings there are smaller, more personal, the mind is able to grasp them to the uttermost. I remember as we stopped at my hotel, being taken suddenly with a tremendous awareness of it all, the n.o.ble river flowing by, the human stream, miles on miles of homes, and the green countryside. I was aware of a city set in an island and an island in the sea, the wide immortal sea going around and around it, the coursing waves--I checked myself in an upward gesture of the arms, as though I had pulsed and surged with it. I caught in my companion's smile a delighted recognition.

”Sh--” he said, ”what'll Flora Haines think of you!”

”Flora! Oh, Flora wouldn't even _think_ about a play-actor. What would your uncle----”

”He's dead now.” He stopped me.

”They are all dead,” I told him, ”all those that mattered to us.”

We had another mood when we came to my rooms. I perceived suddenly what there was in him more than I had known. It was in his manner that he had commanded men. I was pierced through with a sense of his virility, the quality that goes to make a male. I was glad of an excuse to put away my hat and wrap, to escape for a moment from the effect he produced on me ... from inordinate pride in him that he could so produce it. The room was full of the tumult we created for one another.

”Will you sit here?” I said at last. I believe I pushed a chair toward him.

”No, you.” He must have turned it back toward me, otherwise I do not know how I came to be so near him.

”You know,” I said, ... ”I never got your letter.”

”I guessed as much when it came back to me. I should have come to you the next day, but I quarrelled with my uncle. I walked all the way to the railway station before I remembered. But what had I to offer you?”

”It was so long ago ...”

”No, no, yesterday.” His arms were around me. ”Olivia ... yesterday and to-day!”

I think I moved a little to be the more completely engulfed by him, to lay against his the ache of my empty breast; all these years I had not known how empty. We kissed at last and Joy came upon us. We loved; we kissed again between laughter. I remember little s.n.a.t.c.hes of explanation in the intervals of kissing.

”All this time, Helmeth, I have wanted you so.”

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