"This time you can go through with it. Here's a man who will stand by
you forever. I can earn a living for both of us, and--"
"Don't let's discuss the horrid old subject any more to-night ... I'm
tired of discussing ... as you love me, read some poetry to me ... or I
shall scream!"
"Have you ever read the sonnets of George Santayana?... I know most of
them by heart ... let me quote you his best ...
'O world, thou choosest not the better part!
It is not wisdom to be only wise,
And on the inward vision close the eyes,
But it is wisdom to believe the heart.
Columbus found a world, and had no chart
Save one that faith deciphered in the skies
To trust the soul's invincible surmise
Was all his science and his only art.
Our knowledge is a torch of smoky pine
That lights the pathway but one step ahead
Across a void of mystery and dread.
Bid, then, the tender light of faith to shine
By which alone the mortal heart is led
Unto the thinking of the thought divine!'"
* * * * *
"I wish I had written that!" I said, in a hushed, awed voice, after a
moment's silence....
* * * * *
"Now kiss me good-night and go to your tent ... I feel restless,
troubled in spirit, to-night," she said, continuing:
"Perhaps I have been too harsh with Penton....
"He is steering on a chartless sea with no compass....
"No wonder he, and all radicals and pioneers in human thought, blunder
ridiculously....
"The conservative world has its charts, its course well mapped out....
"I suppose I am not strong enough, big enough, for him."
"Hush! now it is you who're just talking!" I replied.
"You're jealous!"
"By God, yes. I _am_ jealous, though I suppose I ought to be ashamed of
it."
* * * * *
She sat in bed, propped up with pillows. She had been reading
Shakespeare's sonnets aloud to me. The big green-shaded reading lamp
cast a dim light that pervaded the room.
She reached out both arms to me, the wide sleeves falling back from
them, and showing their feminine whiteness....
I sat down beside her, caught her to me, kissed her till she was
breathless....
"There ... there ... please! _Please!_"
"What! you're not tiring of my kisses?"
"No, dearest boy, but I have a curious feeling, I tell you ... maybe
we're being watched...."
"Nonsense ... he believes I told him the truth."
And I caught her in my arms again, half-reclining on the bed.
"Sh!" she flung me off with a sudden impulse of frightened strength, "I
hear someone."
"It's only the wind."
"Quick!... my God!"--
* * * * *
I snatched up a volume of Keats. It fell open at "St. Agnes Eve." I
hurled myself into a chair ... gathering my breath I began aloud, as
naturally as I could--
"St. Agnes' Eve! ah, bitter chill it was;
The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold--"
At that very instant, Penton burst in at the door.
He paused a dramatic moment, his back to it, facing us.