"You're the most wonderful friend," he said, "to us both, but especially to Gail. I hope you won't mind me saying it, but I have some idea how you feel toward me."
She tried to protest that he was mistaken. He put his finger to his lips so that she might let him continue.
"I don't think Gail knows the real way you feel. I thank you for that so very much. I want you to know that if I had not been in love with Gail for so long, since we were just kids in high school, I might have married someone else today. Someone very wonderful and fine."
Barbara's heart began breaking all over again, but she kept silent so Paul could say what was in his mind and heart.
"I'm not very good with words, to offer you anything even close to what I might awkwardly call 'consolation.' But I have something to give you, to remind you always of my gratitude and affection for you. First I want to quote some words to you that I discovered in my seminary reading, from St. John of the Cross. He was a missionary priest about four hundred years ago and wrote something that has been a consolation to many others since then..."
Again, Barbara could not imagine what Paul was going to tell her, but listened in the shadows of the corner of the small room as she basked again in the aura of sunshine that he always stood in, at least to her.
"The priest wrote," he said slowly, quietly, "'Where there is no love, put love, and you will find love.'"
Paul Riordan then put a small box in Barbara's hands. Brotherly, he kissed her on the cheek, then left her to go to his bride.
Barbara stood alone for a moment in the corner of the room with others occupied in talk and drink and no one looking at her, then opened the box. Inside she found a small silver pin, to be worn on a blouse or flying jacket. It was a likeness of a winged horse, a Pegasus.
To Barbara it was the symbol of her two most cherished loves -- horses and flying. Then, too, she also thought Paul meant the Pegasus to be a reminder to her of a joining of the three of them as the greatest of friends, always -- she and Gail and Paul.
The pin brought tears to her eyes, but Barbara felt strangely better after her private minutes with Paul, and because of his wedding gift to her. She hoped maybe someday she could, but didn't think she was ready just then to "put love" anywhere, or to anyone, to "find love." But Paul's gentle words and gift were already working their miracles of healing, at least a little.