There was a veiled expression in Peter's eyes that evening when he met
his mother. Passion was exhausted. He divined already that Miranda was
irrecoverable, that pursuit was useless. He now clearly understood how
and why she had suffered. His late agony in her room she had many times
endured, looking in his letters for a passion not yet illumined, eager
to find that he needed her, but finding always that she lived in a
palace of cloud. He saw now that Miranda's love had never been the
dreaming ecstasy from which he himself had just awakened. He remembered
and understood what he had merely accepted as characteristic of her
turbulent spirit--sudden fits of petulance, occasions when without
apparent reason she had flung savagely away from him. There were other
things which thrilled him now, as when her arms tightened about his
neck, and she answered his light caress with urgent kisses.
Peter's mother gave him a note in Miranda's hand:
"PETER,--We are going to Canada, and I am not going to write to
you. I think, Peter, you are only a boy, and one day you will find
out whether you really loved me. I am older than you. I shall not
come back to you, because you are going to be rich, and your
friends cannot be my friends. If you had answered my last letter,
perhaps I could not have done this. But it is better."
When Peter had finished reading he saw that his mother was watching him.
He was learning to notice things. His mother, too, he had never really
regarded except in relation to himself. Yet she had seen unfold the tale
of his passion. She, too, had been affected. He passed her the letter,
and waited as she read.
"You know, mother, what this means?" he asked, shyly moved to confide in
her.
"Yes, Peter, I think I do," she answered, glad of his trust.